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THEM WAS THE 
GOOD OLD DAYS 



THEM WAS THE 
GOOD OLD DAYS 



IN DAVENPORT 




SCOTT COUNTY, IOWA 




W/: L. PURCELL 




("OLD TIMER") 




PUBLISHED BY 

PURCELL PRINTING COMPANY 


■ -"> 


1922 






r 62.<^ 



Copyright 1922, by W. L. Purcell. 

NOV 15'^''? 

(e)riA(>92239 



Here's How! 



TO THE OLD TIMERS OF DAVENPORT: 

MAY YOUR JOURNEY THROUGH THE INDIAN SUMMER 

OF LIFE BE BRIGHTENED WITH HAPPY 

MEMORIES OF THE GOOD OLD DAYS. 




Words and Illustrations Assembled by 
W. L. PURCELL 

Special Cartoons by 
W. A. CEPERLEY 

Photographs Loaned by 
OLD TIMERS OF DAVENPORT 

Reprinted from Sketches Published in 

THE DAVENPORT DEMOCRAT 

With Revisions and Additions 



The Hokum. 

The Alibi 11 

Pep: With and Without _ 21 

Kid Days Along the Levee 23 

Original Simp-Phoney Orchestra 31 

Chawbeef Days at Duck Creek 33 

Corkhill and the Patch 43 

Dancing Days at Mrs. Whistler's 53 

Rollicking Times at Wapsie Shindigs 59 

When the Eclipse Threw a Scare 67 

Slick Skaters and Sweet Singers 71 

Highheel Boots and Bellbottom Pants 77 

With the Boys of Company B 83 

Hoglatin, Gibberish, Slanguage 89 

The Tale of the Scott County Apple 91 

Enough is Suffish 95 

The Carnival City Minstrels 97 

The Tank Town Troupers - 105 

Street Music and Catarrh 109 

An Album of Quaint Types 115 

At the Grumbler's Camp 121 

Encore Music and Elks 123 

The Exile of Johnny Robbins 129 

The Old Turner Hall Crowd 133 

Old Time Cullud Folks 147 

In Dampest Davenport - 153 

Bobbing the Tail of Demon Rum 163 

Hooking Suckers in Little Monte Carlo 167 

Along the Bucktown Rialto 171 

Skunk River Amenities 175 

The Human Fly at the Burtis 179 



N 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Old Jazzdad's Birthplace 187 

What Made Rock Island Great 191 

The Dope on Chief Black Hawk 195 

The Volunteer Fire Laddies 197 

Pioneer Work in Cubist Art 203 

Thuthie Thmither'th Thilly Vertheth 207 

Pretzel Alley 211 

Come Back to Pretzel Alley 216 

Steve Oilman's Nimrods 217 

Billiards and Drum Corps 219 

The Davenport Burns Club 221 

When Folks Were Sociable 225 

Curbstone Merrymakers 227 

The Happy Ending 231 




The Pichers. 

Antoine LeClaire 14 

Colonel George L. Davenport 15 

Mayors of Davenport in the Good Old Days 16 

In the Forties and Nineties 17 

Old Davenport Homestead 19 

Isaac Rothschild 22 

Henry Jaeger's Camp on Second Island 36 

A Fine String of Carp 42 

Original Hotel Davenport 46 

Daddy Davis Clam Chowder Club!. 50 

Dandies of the Seventies 54 

Frank DeWarf 55 

Fresh-Air Club -. 60 

Toot! Toot! The Seventy-Two 66 

All Dolled for Easter Sunday Style Parade 76 

Ted Neuhaus in Belva Lockwood Costume... 84 

Davenport Carnival City Minstrels 96 

Brown and Dewey in Heavy Tragedy 98 

Kindt's Minstrel Troupers at Solon 104 

Grumblers Camp on Smith's Island 120 

Davenport Elks as Filipinos 124 

Flashlight of Russell's Scoopery 128 

John Hill _ 132 

Old Turner Hall 134 

Dutch Treat Days at Old Turner Hall 136 

Peter N. Jacobsen 138 

When Charlie Lippy's Band Played 140 

Taking a Jolt at Charlie Gallagher's 152 

Little Mint on East Third Street 154 

Burial Services of Gooshie Logic 156 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Hotel Davenport Pie-Shaped Bar... . . 162 

When Cob and Packey Were Chums. 174 

Davenport's First Human Fly 178 

Bert Leslie and "Steve Hogan" 182 

First Automobile in Davenport 186 

Famous Never-Sweat Club 190 

The Steamer Donahue 198 

Officials of Court House 202 

Pretzel Alley Press Club Parade. 210 

Bobby Burns 220 

Invitation to Burns Club ... 222 

Scott County Kidneyfoot Club 228 




10 




The Alibi. 

N ORDINARY PERSON, diverging from routine, 
sniffs an impulse to confide the reason therefor, 
to ease devious doubts and to invite dubious 
endorsement: the urge to alibi. The purchase of 
a fliv has been alibied on a salesman's suggestion that the 
air is extremely desirable for a robust neurotic. 

Owney Geegan, of intermittent nerves, diagnosed his 
temperamental ailment as abdominal, easiest appeased by 
stimulant: the satisfactory alibi. . . . To augment his 
discomfort, Owney annexed a wife who tipped the beam at 
two-ten. Explanatory information was vouchsafed to friends 
— difficulties encountered with his fliv, in taking the bumps, 
vanished with connubial conquest: the rear-seat ballast alibi. 
The short-skirt epidemic raged — Owney developing 
opposition. His two-tener, hitting her stride and scenting 
opposition, was a victim of circumstances. An attack of flu, 
four years previously, was the cause of falling hair — Mrs. 
Owney observed one morning — and after visiting a beauty- 
parlor, for expert consultation, she emerged therefrom with 
bobbed hair. The cleaner delivered her best skirt that morn- 
ing, also, and Owney's woman discovered a shrinkage which 
elevated that garment stylishly above her shoetops. 
The afternoon was devoted to explaining, voluminously, to 
incredulous neighbors the how-come of the twin-alibi: short 
skirt and bobbed hair. That evening Owney took one flash 
at his buxom better-half, . . recourse to his satisfac- 

tory alibi restraining homicidal urge. . . . On taking the 
bumps the following Sunday, Owney's fliv was loaded with 
alibis — the satisfactory one and the rear-seat threesome. . 

Frank Gordon, sports editor, solicited a contribution for 
Bob Feeney's "Homade Hooch" column for the Christmas 
issue of the Democrat, to recall "old days down the line." 
Hugh Harrison, city editor, inspected that contribution and 
urged its expansion, with cartoons by "Cep," for the New 
Year's hooch resume. Vince Dorgan recalled some Cork- 



11 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




The Assembler. 

With first pants pocket and coppertoe shoes. 



TINTYPE Br OLMSTEAD. 



12 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




hill characters. Frank Brady spoke 
of old time river camps. Adolph 
Petersen registered old Turner hall 
memories. Walter Blair recalled 
the old darky days. Charlie Kindt 
bubbled reminiscently, and so did 
Ralph Cram. Frank Throop said, 
"Hop to it!" Mary Wright sug- 
gested a jazz volume for historical 
(?) archives. And so! . . . 

Approaching the half century 
milestone, involuntarily we glance 
backward, to observe that time has 
smoothed many rough places; that 
memory delights in mooning half- 
forgotten incidents of the misty 
past. Trifling episodes of youthful 
days take on retrospective charm as the years glide along. . . 

Webster's dictionary, the city directory, newspaper sport 
pages, and street patter were ruthlessly prowled in the task 
of word-assembling. Phrases were lifted, ideas pilfered, 
expressions pirated — resulting in a plagiarized potpourri for 
the delectation and edification of tired old timers. . . . 

In the old days clothes were the handwork of the good 
mother who guided the destinies of numerous progeny. . . 
Frequently clothes were bequeathed from sire to son, and 
from older to younger brother. Coppertoe shoes, incident- 
ally, were the vogue. A young hopeful, enjoying the luxury 
of knee-pants, could not forego the pleasure of inserting a 
thumb in his first pocket, although cautioned to "look pleas- 
ant" and "listen to the pretty birdie." 

Amateur word-assemblers, the first time out, usually 
submit facial credentials — without any apparent justification. 
That custom has been observed in collating "Them Was the 
Good Old Days," by reproducing, on the opposite page, a 
tintype by Olmstead, taken in eighteen-seventy. . . . 

And now, sport, having alibied the prelim, the gong 
sounds that battling call — "Time!" 

Come on — let's go! 



13 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Antoine LeClaire. 

Old Timer who located site for "Them Was the Good Old Days.' 



14 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Colonel George L. Davenport. 

Old Timer who named site for "Them Was the Good Old Days. 



15 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Davenport. 




In the Forties. 




In the Nineties. 



17 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Old Davenport Homestead on Rock Island Arsenal. 



19 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Pep: With and Without. 

Assembling Charles Kingsley's stuff to jazz, 

hen von arc full of pep, sport, 

i\xtb eliorytlmig is jake, 
^£TU mahc the t^rabe nn I]igl|, sport, 

^nb breab ts aiigel-cake. 
^eigh-®! ^tep on tl|e gas, sport — 

43on't take a bachluarb glatice; 
flxne up aitb I] it tl|e ball, sport, 

JViib take a sporting chance* 



en non are sl{u of pep, sport, 
^nb sloluing in tl|e race, 
^on't ti]ink gou're out of luck, sport, 

JFor young Moob sets ttje pace* 
^e game! ^tanb for tl|e ras, sport, 

J\nb lol|en you backioarb gaze, 
fere's l]oping you can cl^irp, sport, 
**®l]em foas tl|e goob olb bays*" 




21 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




-Just to holler "Hello, Isaac!" — 'cause all them little tikes 
liked Mr. Rothschild. 



22 




Kid Days Along the Levee. 

AY, BOB — Don't s'pose you reporters know 
anything about the fun the youngsters had 
in the old days before movies, fxivvers, hip- 
oil, and eskimo pie was invented. Course, 
they didn't have no chili-con-carne, tinfoil 
caramels, nut sundaes, nor all-day suckers 
then, so they had to get by with Kendall's 
baked beans, chewin' wax, molasses candy, 
licorice-root, and ice cream. 

When a coupla kids went gutter-snipin', 
if one found a nickel and the other hollered 
"hav-vers" before his buddy got his fingers 
crossed, he was in fifty-fifty on the findin's. 
Then they'd scoot like the dickens to Black's ice cream par- 
lor on Brady street for a five-cent dish of ice cream with two 
spoons, and Mr. Black would push the specs back on his 
head and divide the cream on the plate so's they wouldn't 
battle about who got the biggest half. After them little lads 
gobbled the ice cream they'd pull straws to see who'd lick the 
plate, the kid who got the long straw bein' the winner. Lotsa 
little gals bought five-cent dishes of ice cream with two 
spoons, too, whenever they "found a nickel rollin' up hill." 
But they wasn't many nickels rollin' in them days. 

Mr, Black was a kind old gent with blue eyes and gray 
sideburns, and he whistled softly when soundin' his "s's". He 
wore a black alpaca coat with the sleeves pulled up to his 
elbows, and his cassimere pants kept ketchin' on the pullon 
strap of his soft-soled congress gaiters. The boys called him 
"Stingy" Black, because he never gave them a good fillin' of 
ice cream for a nickel. 

Say, that was real handmade ice cream, sport! It felt 
as soothin' as liquid sunshine, tickled all the way down, and 
tasted like it was made by the angels. That pair of kids 
had tummy capacity for a gallon of Black's ice cream, and 
standin' room for a coupla hunks of Bremer's cream pie, with- 
out any crowdin'. 



23 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Gutter-snipin' was an excitin' pastime in them days. 
Understand, they wasn't no pavin' on Brady street — only 
macadam and plank sidewalks with slabstone gutters. After 
a rainstorm, little boys went gutter-snipin' — lookin' for small 
change and trinkets that the rain washed down hill to get 
ketched in cracks between the slabstones. Sometimes they 
even picked up ten-cent shinplasters. In them days kids 
hadta dig for what they got. Now all they gota do is sit still 
and wait till the team starts a drive. Purty soft! 

That's the time snipe-shootin' was invented, sport — when 
them young injuns learned to smoke comsilk, rattan, and 
killikinick behind Buckshot Norton's onion barn, back of the 
old market house. Link Starbuck, Stony Johnston, Chub 
Nash, Dick McGuire, Jamthought Jordan, Clint Lee, Lew Orr, 
Frank Robeson, Chub Wells, Doc Lauer, Wade Willey, Billy 
Steams, Merv Agnew, Undershot Brady, Beech Frame, Buck- 
tooth Keck, Muley Mullins, Chook Grady, Pus LeClaire, Brick 
Ogden, Johnny Miclot, Jimmy Dooley, and a lota other dead- 
^_^^___^ game sports took their smokin' lessons in 
^OJ n the alley near Buckshot's barn. Hadta 
show class if you trotted with that bunch. 
No chance if your ma had named you 
Percy, or Harold, or Clarence, or if you 
wore curls. If a kid couldn't smoke two 
pipefuls of killikinick or take a chewa fine- 
cut without throwin' up his heels, he had 
as much standin' with that gang as a 
chinaman. After he graduated and learned 
to spit through his teeth he would be able 
to shoot snipes and blow the smoke through 
his nose like a regular feller. But them 
boys never smoked cigarets — exceptin' "cupebs," and them 
catarrh pills smelled like Jack Munro's blacksmith shop when 
Jack was shoein' a boss. Hadta be mighty careful their dads 
didn't ketch 'em smokin' and to keep an eye peeled for Tile- 
bein, the copper, as old Til was a holy terror for youngsters 
that was breakin' the game laws. 

Kids was awful scared of cops, 'cause they was liable 
to slam 'em inta the hoosegow for nothin' at all. 




24 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

In them days kids belonged to gangs, and when they 
wandered outside their own territory they was Hkely to get 
a good wallopin'. While every gang had its own whistle call 
for help, it was mighty dangerous for a downtown kid to 
cross the territory of the Patch gang, Goosetown gang, or 
Flatiron Square gang unless he was a good foot racer. Now 
we got the Rotary gang, the Kiwanis gang, the Gyro gang, 
the Adclub gang, and a lota other gangs, and them birds 
aint nothin' but just a bunch of growed-up kids. 

The Rogertown gang in East Davenport had a lota hard 
eggs that scared the livin' daylights outa the Mount Ida gang 
and Brady street gang when they went nut- 
pickin' in the fall. Startin' early and takin' 
their lunch, them tads tramped all the way to 
Ashford's pasture, and put in a hard day 
fillin' their sacks with hazelnuts. Comin' 
back, tired and hungry, the wreckin' crew of 
the Rogertown gang would halt 'em near 
Kuehl's hall and ast 'em what right they had 
comin' out there to steal their nuts. Then 
they'd grab the day's work them youngsters 
carried on their shoulders — sorta takin' off 
the peak load. Them Rogertown guys w^as 
awful touchy and their feelin's was easy 
hurt, 'cause if a kid got balky and showed fight they'd gang 
him and give him a good maulin'. Didn't do no good to go 
'round a coupla miles and come home by Jersey Ridge road, 
neither, 'cause they had spotters out to ketch any outsiders 
that stole their nuts — them birds controllin' all the best nut 
orchards from East Davenport to the Wapsie. That's why 
they was so many squirrels up there — Rogertown jakes livin' 
on nuts all winter. But the only way they picked nuts was 
by the sackful, when six of them brave fellers took a sackful 
away from one scared kid. 

It was an awful disgrace in them times for a young lad 
to get caught talkin' to a little gal, exceptin' his sister. If 
he even spoke to his little gal cousin, he'd have to put up an 
airtight alibi or get razzed for bein' a sis. There's lo'fs of 
punishment them little fellers could stand — but not that. 




25 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Patrick T. Walsh 




Father Pelamorgues. 



26 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



When a boy showed up wearin' a paper collar, the gang 
would wise up that he had a mush case on with little Mamie, 
and he'd havta come clean to square himself. If he didn't 
ding the collar pronto, and stop the little gal right in front of 
the gang and tell her to quit speakin' to him, and to mind her 
own darn business, his pals would holler in chorus and say: 

First the radish, then the bean — 
Johnny Smith and Mamie Green. 

Then, if he got sore, they'd dance and sing: 

Johnny's mad and I'm glad 

And 1 know what'll please him— 

A bottle of wine 

To make him shine. 
And Mamie Green to squeeze him. 

Saturday mornin' was a big day on the levee, and the 
kids got an early start so's they could watch Con Mast and 
his dad, his brother Ganny, Dad Sever- 
ance, and them other topnotch fisher- 
men on the log rafts and coal barges, 
pullin' in bass, sunfish, and perch. Dad 
Severance was hep to every good fishin' 
spot from the Rocks to Shantytown. He 
could tell whether grub-worms, crawfish, 
or minnies was the best bait to use ; and 
when the salmon was runnin' in Octo- 
ber, Dad was on the job at Stubb's eddy. 
Cook's point, or Renwick's pier, smokin' 
his briar pipe, and pullin' in the big five- 
pounders with his willow pole, while a 
Iota dubs with the finest fishin' machin- 
ery couldn't even get a bite. 

After them youngsters tired of watchin' the fishin', they'd 
go up and ast Jim Osborne was they any packets comin' in, 
and when Jim told 'em they wasn't nothin' due but the Lone 
Star or a coupla rafters, they'd go up to the Fire King ingine 
house to watch Milt Rowser, Teddy Auerochs, and Bill 
McCrellias polishin' the brass on the Fire King to get that old 
fire ingine dolled up for firemen's parade day, 'cause they 
wanted the Fire King to be shinin' sweller than the Donahue. 




27 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



I saw the boat come 'round the bend — 
Good-bye, my lover, good-bye! 

'Twas loaded down with steamboat men — 
Good-bye, my lover, good-bye! 




Busy Days Down on the Levee. 

Steamboat Saint Paul, Diamond Jo Line Passenger Packet. 



28 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

When they'd ast could they help shine her up, old Bill'd say, 
"Getahell outa here, you doggone little sav- 
ages, or we'll turn the hose on ya!" Old 
Bill always talked in pure steamboat lan- 
guage, he bein' the guy that taught them 
steamboat mates, raftsmen, and the molders 
at Davis's threshin' machine foundry how 
to put real kick in their conversation. Then 
the kids would holler to old Bill, "Dare ya 
to, ya big stiff, ya!" and they'd leg it down 
the alley back of Van Patten and Marks, and 
crawl into them big sugar hogsheads that 
the steamboats brung up from New Or- 
leans, to dig out the brown sugar that had 
melted between the staves. 

Ever know the handiest tool for a youngster, sport — out- 
side a pocketknife? Why, it's a hoss-shoe nail. Comes in 
handy for chinkin' off brown sugar in hogsheads, and for 
holdin' up pants when the buttons snap off — them little lads 
only wearin' pants, waists, and 'spenders, and mebbe a hat. 
Usta swipe hoss-shoe nails at Jack Speed's hoss-shoein' shop 
when they was shoein' flies for Jack while he was manicurin' 
the boss's hoofs. 

Them arabs never wore shoes then — exceptin' on Sun- 
days — and when a kid showed up with new shoes that 
squeaked, all the gang would havta take turns and spit on 
'em to christen 'em by spoilin' the shine. A new suit hadta 
be christened too, a kid always feelin' ashamed 'til he rassled 
in his new handmedowns. 

When they got through stokin' up on brown sugar, they'd 
watch Lew Marks sortin' oranges and bananas, and wait 
till he'd throw away the specked ones, when they was some 
awful scramblin' done — most of them oranges only bein' half 
rotten. 

After mixin' specked oranges and bananas with the 
brown sugar, they'd romp around to Second street, past Roth- 
schild's clothing store, just to holler "Hello, Isaac!" — 'cause 
all them little tikes liked Mr, Rothschild. And when it came 
time to get a suit of clothes in the fall, their dads gave Isaac 



29 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



the standoff — and mebbe they paid and meb- 
be they thought Isaac was easy and they'd 
play their jack on the growler. 

Then they'd move along and circle 
around Richter's open-faced stuffed bear that 
stood up on his hind legs a-holdin' on to a 
pole with his front paws. They'd holler and 
make faces at the bear, to show that they 
wasn't afraid, and brag about how they'd kill 
grizzlies and Indians when they growed up 
and went to Texas to hunt buffaloes with 
Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack — them good old 
scouts bein' the grandest men in the world, 
accordin' to them youngsters. 

If an ice wagon with the sign "Ice, E. Peck," came 
rumblin' by, and one kid hollered, "What d'ya see when the 
iceman comes?" another kid would answer, "I — see — Peck!" 
Then they'd jump on the tailboard and ast August for a piece 
of ice, so's they could cool the speckled fruit that was fer- 
mentin' with the brown sugar, but they never even dreamed 
that they was the originators of orange ice and banana flip. 





s^'i^^^S^ 






30 




Original Simp-phoney Orchestra. 

Hearin' the gangsaw singin' down at 
Schricker and Mueller's sawmill, they'd 
hotfoot it to Scott street, through the lum- 
ber yard, to watch the logs glidin' up the 
chute to be chewed into lumber, or they'd 
start a game of banter or wood-tag on the 
boom, of the log raft. 

Talk about singin', sport — that old 
Schricker and Mueller gangsaw had it all 
over Caruso or John McCormack, and you 
could hear it from Mount Ida to Rockingham. It would 
modulate its voice when the wind shifted, and do creepy, 
tremolo stuff that sounded like a million mockin' birds was 
spillin' out melody in a singin' contest, or like all the banshees 
from Ireland was workin' in harmony. Why, even the old 
Helen Blair, comin' around the bend of the river, and blowin' 
her quivery baritone whistle, sounded purtier than Mary 
Garden, or Galli-Curci, or any of them high-steppin' janes 
that's squawkin' outa talkin' machines now'days. 

That's where music fans got this symphony orchestra 
idea, sport — tryin' to give an imitation of the old buzzsaw 
moanin' and sobbin' its way through a tough knot in a juicy 
pine log down at Schricker and Mueller's. When the sawmill 
buzzsaw and steamboat siren done a jazz duet on a windy day, 
doublin' up with the glucose aroma that crowded the south- 
ern summer breeze, Davenport's original simp-phoney orches- 
tra was dishin' up free nose and ear music for everybody. 

After a hurryup visit to Berger's livery, to help Taich Ber- 
ger and Hank Treffs curry bosses and swob buggies, them 
arabs trotted down to the Liberty fire engjne house on Brown 
street to admire the fireman's statue standin' up in the cupola, 
with the trumpet to his lips like he was givin' orders to the 
firemen. Then they'd flip a farm wagon for a ride up-town, 
unless somJe old heiney from the Lumberyard gang hollered 
"Whip behind!" to the farmer. 



31 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

The waterworks whistle blowin' about this time, them 
kids would notice that it was about time to slip on the feed 
bag, so they'd call it a half day and toddle home to dinner. 

The biggest honor for a kid in them days was torchboy 
for the Rescues of Fifth Ward hose company, so's he could 
sport a fireman's uniform — double-breasted red flannel shirt 
with brass buttons, white pants, helmet, and 
torch — and step along in the fireman's day 
parade. A torchboy had his gang bumin* 
with envy, and they'd scamper along the 
march, hollerin' to their buddy, wishin' they 
was wearin' a red shirt. 

Next best honor to torchboy was totin' 
the bass drum in Haverly's minstrels street 
parade. Many hard-fought battles was pulled 
off in Burtis theatre alley to decide who's 
turn it was to tote the bass drum. Even 
holdin' music for the cornet solo guy at the 
minstrel band's evening concert would send 
a youngster to the hay sparklin' with happiness. 

Yes, indeed — them was the good old days! The trouble 
was them young fellers didn't know when they was well off. 
Always wishin' to be men so's they could have a toothbrush 
handle peekin' outa their vest pocket, or grow whiskers like 
a doctor, or have wax-end soup-strainers like them dandy 
dudes that wore bell-bottom jeans pants. Then, when they 
growed up to be men, they switched the hokum and wished 
they was kids again. 

Lotsa wimmen folks get chicken ideas, too. They teehee 
and doll up like kindergarten babies, but they don't fool 
nobody — unless it's the makeup they see in their handbag 
mirrors. 

All the nuts don't grow in Ashford's pasture, sport, and 
a lota smart folks ain't got no license to wonder how them 
pop-eyed hopheads get that way. 




'^ 



32 




Chawbeef Days at Duck Creek. 

AY, BOB — Even if kids didn't have sandy 
beaches and enclosed nats in the old days, 
they had some dandy swimmin' places — 
not countin' the Arp and Reuber swimmin' 
house at the foot of Perry, where a kid could 
take a swim in the little hole for a nickel 
or in the big hole for a dime. On Satur- 
days, though, there was such a mob waitin* 
in line that old Reuber'd only let 'em stay in 
a half hour^ when he'd chase 'em out with a 
bamboo pole. Boys didn't wear swimmin' 
suits then, and a kid that brung soap and towel got razzed for 
bein' a dude. 

Rooks's brickyard pond, in the ravine at Tenth and Gaines, 
was a dandy swimmin' hole, exceptin' it had a mushy yaller 
clay bottom and gangrene scum around the edges. Folks 
said it wasn't healthy to swim there, but the kids didn't 
believe 'em. The irish canaries that boarded in Rooks's pond 
had fine baritone voices, and on moonlight nights you could 
hear 'em chantin' in mournful chorus down to Schuetzen park. 
The swimmin' hole under the oak trees in Farnam street 
woods was the cushiest place, but it was risky for outside 
kids to take a chance swimmin' there unless they stood in 
with the Corkhill gang, them guys takin' full charge of all 
that territory after they chased the injuns out. 

The best swimmin' hole was in Baker's cow pasture, west 
of Brady at Duck creek. There wasn't nobody there to chase 
youngsters just when the fun was gettin' good, but sometimes 
they hadta stay in all afternoon, 'cause they'd get splattered 
with mud and havta jump in again and wash off, unless the 
gang agreed to let 'em out. 

Of course, it was different when lunch time came, when 
they'd build a fire to bake potatoes or roast corn on hot coals, 
or fry a yaller-bellied mudcat if fishin' was good, or boil 
eggs in a tomato can. Didn't make no difference if ashes 



33 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Old High School at Sixth and Main. 




Old Stone School at Seventh and Perry. 




Old Mount Ida School at Mississippi and Fulton. 



34 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

and dirt got mixed with that grub, it tasted better than any 
of the chuck they got at home. Or, mebbe they'd hike to 
Gilruth's orchard out on Harrison street, to prowl for bell- 
flowers and russets, and grab onions, grapes, and sweet pota- 
toes on the way. Then they'd sit around the fire to enjoy a 
good smoke of porous driftwood or the ripe cigars they picked 
from catalpa trees, and talk about how fine it would be if 
they w£s out on the plains fightin' redskins with the old 
scouts they read about in Beadle's dime novels and the Boys 
of New York Weekly. Then they'd go buffalo huntin' — 
chasin' Baker's cows over the meadows, and sayin' "Bang! 
Bang!" every time they'd draw a bead on them wild animals 
with their trusty old rifles that was made outa cornstalks. 

Some days, after listenin' to George Baker's wonderful 
snake stories, they went explorin' in the willows for hoop- 
snakes. George told 'em that when a hoopsnake seen a guy 
comin' it would grab the end of its tail in its mouth and 
whirl through the pasture like a bat outahell, not stoppin' for 
nothin' unless it bumped against a tree or rail fence. 

George said he'd seen lotsa hoopsnakes 
— and jointsnakes, too, and George said if 
a kid whacked a jointsnake with a slippery- 
elm club it would fly to pieces, and the 
pieces would all come together again at 
sundown, and the jointsnake would be doin' 
business at the old stand the next day. If 
a kid ever got stung by a rattler or copper- 
head, George said, the only cure was to 
hike to Pillion's and drink a quart of forty- 
rod likker. 

Al Lindsay told them little fellers they couldn't kill all 
of a snake or turtle in the daytime — that even if they 
chopped 'em into little pieces the heads would live 'til sun- 
down. George and Al lived on the banks of that stream and 
was the big authority on Duck creek snakes in them times. 
But in all their explorin', from the Hospital to the Orphans' 
home, the nearest them kids ever come to seein' a hoopsnake 
or a jointsnake was when they killed a ferocious gartersnake 
or drownded out a gopher. 



35 





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THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

One Saturday the Locust street gang started from Eagel's 
grocery store on a hike to the creek, and began playin' banter 
at Brewster's place near the old Fair grounds, and kept it 
up clear out to the Black Hills saloon. 

Charlie Osborn was leader, and when he ast them little 
men if they all was game enough to folly their leader in any- 
thing he done, they said they was. So Charlie peeled off all 
his togs under the big maple when they got near Balluff's, and 
Lew Wicksey and more than a dozen kids foUyed suit. Then 
Charlie started the percession with a yell, and they raced a 
half mile to the creek, carryin' their duds in their hands, 
whoopin' and hollerin' like wild injuns out on the warpath. 
Even if there wasn't many houses along there then, the wim- 
men folks that seen them skinny legs flyin' past musta thought 
that nuts was gettin' ripe purty early that season. 

After they paddled around in the swimmin' hole for an 
hour or so, with Gus Paine, Joe Orendorff, and Mike Rus- 
sell, collectin' leeches, sandburrs, and sun- 
burn in fifteen inches of water, they heard 
that horrible cry that always puts a feelin' 
of terror in the heart of a kid in swimmin' 
— "Chaw beef!" Then they knew that 
Bob Armil and Howey Oliver, leaders of 
the notorious Noels's woods gang, had 
snuck up while they was en joy in' their- 
selves, and that dirty work was bein' done, 
as them two mallards was the champeen 
chawbeefers in that neck of the woods. 
There was some wild scramblin' by them little lads for 
their togs, and after they fished 'em outa the creek, chawed the 
knots loose with their teeth, and spread 'em out to dry, it was 
gettin' nigh on to supper-time. On the way home they 
remembered they had forgot about pilin' the big load of wet 
wood the millman brung from Renw^ick, Shaw, and Crosset's 
durin' the week, and they knew they was due for a good 
lammin' when their dads started astin' questions, unless they 
could get away with the old alibi about bein' sick in the 
stummick. 

Them was the good old days, sport! 




37 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

They wasn't no wild wimmen pickin' tame flowers then, 
nor no tame wimmen pickin' wild flowers. When a flocka 
janes took to the timber for an outin', they'd pick mayapples, 
wild strawberries, and hazelnuts, but they never run hogwild 
and pulled 'em up by the roots. Only the men folks done 
the killin' — poppin' the robins, woodpeckers, and other song- 
birds with their muzzle-loaders, just for fun, and helpin' civ- 
ilization along by cleanin' up the prairie chickens, bobwhites, 
and pheasants. Then there was the old sports that thought 
duckshootin' too tame. Them old roosters took trips to the 
wild prairies of Nebraska to slaughter meek-eyed buffaloes 
that just had noodle enough to folly the leader. There's a 
coupla buffaloes in Fejervary park now, and it might be a good 
idea to stick a few wild flowers and ferns down there — or in 
the Academy of Sciences — so's that the next generation kin 
see what them things looked like. 

When Leas Lingafelt introduced grape- 
fruit in this burg, Neil Collamer laughed, 
and said he'd rather sink a tooth into a 
hedgeball or a hunk of limburger than in 
one of them darn things. Frank Paddock 
passed up them jumbo lemons, too, sayin' 
they was n. g. Hugh Barr couldn't even 
con his two salesmen, Oyster Jim and 
Celery Pete, to tackle grapefruit. Them 
two birds said that just because they 
started Hugh in the fish business, and 
could hoist anything in the moisture 
market, was no reason why Hugh should try to feed 'em big 
quinine pills. Leas then ast Charlie Robeson would he try 
his taster, and Charlie said that he'd try anything once. When 
he put away the first grapefruit raw, the other yaps expected 
to see the butcher boy knocked stiff. But Charlie was game, 
and only said it tasted kinda bitter. Then he seasoned the 
next one with a dash of mustard and some sugar, and said it 
tasted finer than Charlie Cavanaro's Florida oranges. 

Then Doc Sharon and Senator Gorman split a grapefruit, 
sprinkled it with sugar, and said it was the next best bet to 
wild strawberries or Bob Pringle's cream puffs. 




38 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

In them days Leon Allen's dad and Tommy McKinney's 
dad had hot arguments in the old Farnam street roundhouse 
regardin' whose boy was the keenest at eatin' arithmetic — 
both of them youngsters bein' johnny-at-the-rathole when it 
come to figgerin', and the smartest boys in their schools. 
Leon's dad said his boy was. Tommy's dad said his boy 
was. So, after Jake Goehring balked on refereein' the argu- 
ment, them two dads framed for a joint debate to a decision 
on the next Sunday afternoon. When time was called Leon's 
dad examined his son, and Tommy's dad examined his son, 
and decimals and geometry was bein' batted all over the 
room. Then, while the two proud dads was summin' up and 
argufyin' the case all over, the two little shavers slipped out 
into the back yard to play a game of jacks. Then they played 
a game of mibs for keeps. Then Tommy traded five com- 




In the Academy of Sciences. 

mies and a glassie to Leon for a blind agate. Then Leon 
traded his top to Tommy for a big whiteally and his two- 
licker taw. And about the time them little lads was gettin' 
ready to swap jackknives, sight-unseen, their dad's came out 
and told 'em who was winners in the big contest in arithmetic. 
Never heard of Crazy Litz, didya, sport? Well, he was 
a kinda queer old geezer that growed rusty whiskers and lived 
in a shanty up in Main street hollow. He usta mind his own 
business and keep his trap shut, and, naturally, people thought 
he was coocoo. He was easy teasin' for the kids, and when 
he wandered down town they follyed him, hollerin' "Crazy 
Litz is gettin' fits!" One hot day in August they was tor- 
mentin' him by yellin' and throwin' clods, when the old man 



39 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

flew clear off the handle, grabbed a tantalizin' youngster and 
gave him a blamed good maulin'. Then old Crazy Litz was 
pinched for disturbin' the peace, and he done a thirty-day 
stretch in the cooler. After they turned him loose he could 
walk by the Sixth street gang any time, and not a peep outa 
any of 'em. And that gang had such hard eggs as Charlie 
Haskins, Ed Webb, Jim Hurd, Harry High, Tom Lowery, 
Johnny Drew, Ed Marvin, Harry Eldridge, Billy Coulter, 
Bill Dooley, Dave Magoun, Tim Parker, Ed Hood, Billy 
Webb, Ferd Mast, Wils McClelland, Chet Croul, Pickels 
Gildea, Jack Leonard, Charlie Barnes, Butch Thiele, Hons 
McGee, Win McChesney, Dinny Denison, Jack Berryhill, 
Tom Griggs, Brock Darling, Tip Nealey, Peg Donahoo, Jim 
Flemming and Jack Cook. 

Jim Flemming and Jack Cook were the radio boys of the 
old days. They had the first private telegraph line in this 
burg, a block long, runnin' from their 
homes, on the corners of Brady and Main 
along Sixth street. When them boy 
wizards practiced operating kids usta press 
their ears to the telegraph poles to listen 
in. They could hear Jim and Jack con- 
fabbing by the way the wire hummed, but 
they couldn't understand telegraph lan- 
guage. 

Jim and Jack gabbed through the first 
telephone, too, and they helped string the 
wire. That telephone was a great dish for 
the natives, and the two oil-spreaders that operated it tore off 
lotsa mazume. It reached from the roof of Doc Mitchell's 
sample rooms at Brady and Commercial alley to the sidewalk 
at Rothschild's clothin' store on Second and Brady. A nosey 
mob gathered around, takin' turns talkin' at ten cents a talk. 
Two bakin' powder cans \vithout covers, connected with a 
fishline, stretched across the street, and them cans was used 
both for talkin' and hearin*. 

That telephone line got an awful play, sport, but nobody 
ever heard the bird on the roof say "the line's busy." But 
he was a flip young feller, and he'd say "pull down your vest" 




40 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

and "wipe off your chin," bein' a hound for usin' the latest 
slang of them times. Now'days if some sap asts for number 
3333, after the little lady with the ukelele voice repeats them 
numbers, with all the canary bird thr-r-rills, it sounds like 
Frank Fick tunin' his flute to shoot a quickfire cadenza for 
the symphony jays that inhale wop opera. 

In these times wimmen use lotsa makeup on telephone 
gab, workin' two brands of lingo — the cardparty guff and 
kitchen variety. When the bell rings, and a dame gurgles 
"Hel-1-o-o-o-uh!" — all drippin' with honey — it sounds sweeter 
than Mendelssohn's "Spring Song" usta sound when Jake 
Strasser was leadin' his swell orchestra. But if a roughneck 
brother^ or sumpin, hooks on the line, the sweet voice bawls, 
"Oh! It's you, is it!" — soundin' like a strawboss razzin' a 
herda hunks. It's sure tough, sport, after dopin' the settin' 
for high-class shootin' to have the prize headache horn in. 




41 




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Corkhill and the Patch. 




AY, BOB— REMEMBER Jerry the Fiddler 
in the old Corkhill days, when he usta 
play the "Connukman's Rambles" and the 
"Devil's Dream" for the shindigs on Cork- 
hill and the Patch — how he made more 
music with the foot than with the fid? 

I don't s'pose you remember "Jerry's 
Bridge" on Rock Island street, from Tenth 
to Eleventh, neither — and how the old 
moon shimmered on the crisp snow on a 
winter's evenin', and winked when you 
looked down "Doogan's Rawveen"? 
Don't remember when Yankee Robinson's one-ring cir- 
cus showed on the Patch, and how the old clown sung "Pullin' 
Hard Against the Stream"? 

In this world I've gained my knowledge. 

And for it I've had to pay, 
Though I never went to college, 

Still I've heard the poet say: , 

Life is like a mighty river, , 

Runnin' on from day to day, 
Men are vessels cast upon it, 

Sometimes wrecked and cast away. 

Then do your best for one another, 

Makin* life a pleasant dream, 
Help a v\rorn and w^eary brother 

Pullin' hard against the stream. 

Say, boy — that was some singin'! 

Nor you haint got no recollection of Hons McGee and 
Cal Gillooley when they was drivin' the cows to pasture to 
Farnam street woods in the mornin's and bringin' 'em back 
for milkin' in the evenin's, and how Hons was always whist- 
lin' for his dog Shep. 

Never heard of good old Brahaney, and how the kids 
usta tease him and holler, "Brahaney, will yer dog bite?" 
just to get him to chase 'em? 

It's a ten-to-one bet you never heard about John Driscoll 
blowin' the depot whistle at the old roundhouse at Fifth and 



43 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Farnam, and that you didn't never know that railroad time 
was fifteen minutes earUer than city time in them days. 

Don't know about them times, huh? 
Well, you're a fine bird for Corkhill 
reporter ! 

About all that you newspaper guys 
does now'days is put on the feedbag, 
hustle for hooch, and shake the jazz leg 
with them bobhair janes. 

Why, in the old days, when a little 
cutie bobbed her hair and came sailin' 
down the line, the kids usta holler, 
"Chippie, get yer hair cut — fifteen cents!" 
Little gals was so bashful then that they 
usta blush, and a vamp was called a tramp. 

In them times, old George Ballou did all the reportin' 
and editin' on that sheet of yourn, and John Hassen and Tom 
Woods did the printin' — no matter how near pickled they 
was. Now who's doing all the shootin' at the payroll? 

And George didn't run no pichers of society razberries, 
efficiency experts, bootleggers, oil-stock easers, and guys that 
works in banks, neither. 
Nothin' like that! 

The only pichers that George run was Lydia Pinkham's 
compound, Saint Jacob's oil, Hostetter's bitters, and a coupla 
Jersey cafTs, and he run 'em every day, not every three weeks. 
When an ad was set up it was up, and Mayor Claussen 
couldn't change it unless he squared things with Aleck 
Anderson or Cy Darling. 

Another thing, Bob: In them days a guy needin' eye 
exercise had to go to the Burtis to watch Alice Gates and 
her "English Blondes" or slip into a barber shop and double-O 
the Police Gazette. Now them underwear and silk stockin' 
ads get the up-and-down and nobody never takes a peek at 
the Police Gazette. It's too tame. 

And, bein' as Charlie Kindt's showshop blooied when 

that firenut broke out of the cuckoo factory, you're outa luck. 

Them ad club guys puts so much stuff on the ball that 

it gives folks all the thrills their blood pressure will stand 



44 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

under. They sure help to start people wearin' them big 
hornrimmed specs, and a weaktop guy gets away with a lota 
stuff by sportin' them hootowl cheaters. 

Wimmen don't care to read nothin' now but half-off 
sale ads and cartoons, or something about operations for 
adenoids and tonsils. And when some advertisin' slicker puts 
over a come-on sale to work off holdover flyswatters in the 
wintertime, the rush begins, and they kin hardly wait for 
the doors to open. 

Then the riot call comes in to Billy Claussen up at the 
works for the extra harness bulls and flydicks to hurry up 
and tame the mob. And all this is done without usin' no 
likker nor hooch whatsoever. Ads has an awful kick in 'em. 

Anybody except an out-and-out dumbell kin grab an 
awful laugh out of the news your sheet 
keep shootin' about Ireland bein' free — 
now. 

Where do you reporters get that 
"now" stuff? 

Why, freein' old Ireland was all 
cooked and dried in the old days when 
the Land League was hittin' her up in 
Forrest block hall at Fourth and Brady. 
Parnell was the main screw in them days, 
and the debatin' club of the Land League 
burned up Johnny Bull every Sunday 
evenin'. That was when the Deputies made sleep a losin' 
game for the boys that wore the galways — when they was 
supposed to be drillin' in the drill-halls under the churches. 
Anybody that ever watched them hard-workin' old turks 
marchin' in a Saint Patrick's day parade could see that the 
only drillin' they ever done was on a handcar or up at the 
stone quarry gettin ready for the blast. In them parades they 
was all out of step but Curbstone Jim, and Jim was ridin' a 
swayback. 

Why, there's a coupla loaded ivories livin' in this burg 
that believes them drill stories even to this day, and they 
come out of their holes every election time to hang a few 
whispers on the wires. 




45 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Original Hotel Davenport. 

Famous hostlery of old days, when Davenport was a popular 

summer resort for southern aristocrats. 



46 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Never heard about the Land League debatin' club bat- 
tles, Bob, and how the Corkhill jakes and Slough jakes 
used to flock to 'em? 

Well, a little wisin'-up won't hurt you. 

Some of the hottest battles ever fought to free old Ire- 
land was pulled off by the debatin' club in them days. 

The fighters was trained to the minute and kept right 
in the pink up to the tap of the gong, the same as these lads 
that puts on the scraps at the Legion hall now. Only the 
style of fightin' and the rules was different. 

They wasn't no clinchin' and no stallin', but they was 
plenty of jabbin' and footwork and windjammin'. The fighters 
fought one at a time, and they used eight-pound words 
instead of eight-ounce gloves. They uppercut with short- 
arm swings, and blocked with dirty looks, and tried to put 
across the haymaker with wild swingin' and cruel adjectives. 

In them days the fighters wasn't hoggin' for the big 
crack at the gate receipts, and they wasn't no chewin' about 
weights or havin' their purty fingers manicured. Them boys 
just naturally mixed it because they loved the fightin' game. 

But the great championship battle to free Ireland, and 
the biggest ever pulled by the Land League, was held on the 
evenin' of Saint Patrick's day in the mornin'. 

The hall was packed and jammed long before the first 
prelim, and after some guy sung Joe Murphy's funny song 
about "A Handful of Earth," the main go was announced. 

The big prize at that championship battle was for a 
decision at catch weights to settle that one big question: 

"Resolved, that Ireland is, and of right ought to be, a 
free and independent nation." 

To give you reporters some idea of what a whale of a 
show it was, they had to have three referees for that big 
contest. Harry McFarland was the chief referee, with Duck 
McKee and Spud Flynn for assistants. Fred Sharon was 
timekeeper, and Kernel Ed O'Brien was bottle-holder. All 
these lads, understand, was born-and-bred Corkhill boys, and 
strictly on the wagon. 

It was a battle royal from the first tap of the gong till 
old Johnny Bull was stretched stiff and cold for the full count. 



47 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Four of the cleverest little lightweights in the west was 
carded for that contest, and they put up the fight of their 
lives. There was young Kid Vollmer of the Brickyard gang 
and Cyclone Lischer of the Sawmill gang, on the negative 
side, paired against Spider Bollinger of the Mount Ida gang 
and Kayo Gundaker of the Fifth street gang, on the affirma- 
tive side. 

There wasn't a dull spot in the program. 
Each scrapper was allowed to fight a fifteen-minute 
round in the semi-windup, and a fast three-minute whirl on 
the windup, so's he could mop up the other guy with the 
comeback. 

Every round went the full limit in slam-bang style, 
tooth-and-nail. Talk about shadow boxing, speedy foot- 
work, swingin' with the right, uppercuttin' with the left, and 
playin' for the wind! Never nothin' like it! 

Why, the audience was hollerin' their heads off, and the 
cheerin' got so terrific that the folks at Turner hall had to 
call time on a German play called "Gesundheit" that was 
bein' pulled down there. 

But listen: At the finish the referees begun to mix 
and lock horns on the decision. Them guys had some fightin' 
blood in their boilers, too. But finally they adjourned to 
the supreme court of the debatin' club in the back room of 
John Lillis's grocery store, where they fought the battle all 
over again, round by round. And the 
next day the ice went out. 

On the followin' Sunday evenin' the 
referees handed in their decision in favor 
of the battlers on the negative side, by 
declarin' that their argument was a clean 
knockout for freein' Ireland. As that 
made it unanimous, the little old Green 
Isle was then and there declared a free 
and independent nation. 

So all this noise that's bein' pulled 
now over in the Old Sod is just so much 
highjack flimmin' of the business agents, 
stallin' so they won't lose their jobs and havta go to work. 




48 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

If them birds hadn't horned in and mussed things, and 
had stood for the hard-fought decision of the Land League 
debatin' club, all this jobbin' wouldn't have took place. 

But then I s'pose. Bob, it's the business of business 
agents to keep guys from doin' business that wants to do 
business. 

There was some famous old ringsiders squatted in the 
front row at that big battle. There was Jerry Driscoll, Char- 
lie Hubbell, Owen Murray, Billy Gordon, Mike Kilfeather, 
Ike Deutsch, Dan Keeler, John Crowley, Pat Hanley, Luke 
Brennan, Jack Mullins, Johnny Grady, Dan Home, Fonse 
Arnould, Jack Bryson, Cobb McMahon, Jappy Miclot, Banty 
Keating, Eddie Slevin, Pat Lannon, Jim O'Connor, Webb 
Mason, Simon Garvey, Jimmy Currey, Joe Hart, Billy 
Gilooley, John A. Feeney, Dannie Kennedy, Cully McCabe, 
Ed Connole, Jim Halligan, Ed McCormick, Pascal Pucinelli, 
Martin Downs, Goat Dwyer, and a lota other descendants of 
the Old Sod. 

There's a whole lot of old time hits that you newspaper 
guys could dish up that'd be more interestin' to the ladies than 
them market reports and Fatty R. Buckle stories you keep 
runnin'. Gal readers needs more attention than they been 
gettin', now that they kin vote and work on the juries. 

Wimmen isn't always 'preciated, Bob. In the old days 
they saved a lota coin for the taxpayers by sweepin' up 
cigaret butts and tobacco juice with their long trailers. Now 
the city has to operate electric sweepers at a big expense, 
and taxes keep jumpin' higher and higher. 

And a lota soreheads was beefin' then about wimmen's 
styles — just like they is now. 

What do them birds want? Can't they 'preciate artistic 
dressin', or do they want all the swell dames runnin' around in 
mother hubbards and sunbonnets so they'll look like a herd 
of cattle? 

Admittin' that straw hats is now due for springin', you 
kin expect another yawp from them baldheaded guys that 
has to wear nightcaps to warm their knobs these cold evenin's. 

If you reporters was keen to the job there'd be a hot 
pannin' comin' to them knockin' crabs. 



49 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Daddy Davis Clam Chowder Club. 
Ferd Haymeyer, chef, at Ashford's Pasture. 



50 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Course, some grumpy guys don't mind seein' other guys' 
janes wearin' that upstage stuff, but they want their janes 
to lay off'n it. 

Men is hard to please, Bob. Most of 'em has a streak 
of squirrel about a yard wide in their makeup, and it only 
takes a coupla shots of hooch to make 'em show that they 
aint nobody home. 

Unless some of them pink dreamers up at the City Hall 
gets an adjustment and wakes up before the good old sum- 
mertime cracks open, you kin get all sittin' pritty for the 
season. That is, provided them aldermen don't get nosey 
and pass an ordinance to make them bathin' beauties cover 
up with blankets or towels when they parade to that new 
swimmin' joint down on the levee next summer. 

Any ordinance that blocks 'em will need more kick 
than this two-bit brew is got — you kin tell the world. 

File your application for charter member of the Rockin'- 
chair club that's just organized, as all of the club members 
will get clubby and camp under the can- 
opy at the Saint James down on Main 
street, to see at what's seein' and to look 
at what's looking — the beerkegs or broom 
sticks, the broads or bean-poles, Nothin' 
barred. 

Of course, the lamps of some of the 
old timers in the Rockin'-chair club is still 
doin' business for distance, and they ain't 
so poor on closeup stuft, but if it gets so's 
they're overlookin' any big bets on late 
styles in figleafs and colored beads on the 
bathin' beauty circuit, you kin lay down a small piece of 
change that they'll step on the gas and speed to the oculist 
for some of that first-aid stuff. 





51 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Dandies of Mrs. Whistler's Dancing School. 

Warren Scott, Charlie Russell, Charlie Baker, Will Wadsworth, 
Fred, Decker, Ira Gifford, Ed Webb, George Gillette. 



52 




Dancing Days at Mrs. Whistler's. 

IDN'T know that Buffalo Bill held his first 

wild west exhibition in a sideshow tent in 

the vacant lot just below Fourth, on the 

east side of Brady, didya, sport? Had a 

coupla circus bosses, buckin' bronchos, 

cowboys, buffaloes, pigeon-toed squaws, 

and real Sioux injun bucks, who wouldn't 

steal anything that was nailed down or 

was too heavy for the squaws to carry. 

Nor you didn't know they had signs, 

"Walk your bosses on the bridge," posted 

on that government driveway, and how a guy was liable 

to get chucked in the guardhouse if his spav happened to 

break into a trot? 

Never heard nothin' about the old-time dancin' days, 
either, didya? Well, Mrs. Whistler's dancin' school, at Elev- 
enth and Perry, was the trainin'-ground for teachin' young 
bloods to "daunce the launcers and all the fauncy daunces," 
includin' the waltz, polka, schottische, and square dances. 

There wasn't no neckin', strangle-holts, nor half-nelson 
clutches at Mrs. Whistler's — only old-fashioned long-distance 
grips, holdin' the gal at arms-len'th, as though she was liable 
to bite you. If any smarty got actin' cute, and attempted 
any closeup stuff, his dancin' partner would box his ears 
darn quick. 

When Mrs. Whistler raised her skirt to her shoe-tops, 
to show the boys the dance movement, Charlie Baker, Tim 
Murphy, Nat Harris, Clarence Cochrane, Fred Decker, and 
Art Sampson usta blush like fury, and rush to the hallway — 
they was so embarrassed. 

Tuesday night was the big night for the boys at Mrs. 
Whistler's, and you could depend on meetin' Ernie Allen, 
Charlie Dixon, Ira Gifford, Ed Webb, Nick Kuhnen, Duke 
Martin, Ike Deutsch, Will Altman, Win Scott, Charlie Rus- 
sell, Bird Richardson, Art Wallace. Will Wadsworth, John 



53 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Dandies of the Seventies. 

Frank Gillette, Henry Carniichael, Jack Van Tuyl. 



54 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Van Patten, Harry Smith, Charlie Leslie, Ed Leonard, Will 
Axtman, Jules Gaspard, Jim Smith, Harry Kirk, Warren 
Scott, Billy Evers, Harry Wadsworth, Howard Nott, Fred 
Crouch, George Iles^ and Vic Littig at dancin'-school, listen- 
in' to swell piano music and trainin' their dogs to behave, so's 
they could take a jump into society. 

Before the reverse waltz came into 
fashion the dancers usta spin one-way, 
windin' up till they got dizzy, and then 
unwindin' by spinnin' the other way. Some 
dancers had their carburetors adjusted so's 
they could whirl one way as long as the 
music played without gettin' seasick. 

We had some high old times at the 
Fire King dances, too, when Bob Swindell 
and his brother Nin did the fiddlin', with 
Hughey Mullin sawin' the hossfid. Some- 
times, when the dancers was hittin' up the Virginia reel, and 
havin' the time of their lives, Bob would join in the grand- 
right-and-left, playin' his fid and mixin' with the dancers. 
One evenin', when Hughey was feelin' kinda so-so, him and 
Nin joined the grand-right-and-left with Bob, and dogged, if 
Hughey didn't drag the old hossfid with him, dancin' it up 
and down the line, and when Bob called "Sv/ing yer partner!" 
Hughey swung that big fid of his'n and didn't skip a note. 

Talk about jolly times, sport! More fun'n a boxa 
monkeys ! 

Why, in the old days, when Charlie 
Cam.eron and his gal, and George Ott and 
his gal, usta dance the redowa at Burns's 
festival, all the dancers just naturally 
slipped to the side lines to watch them 
tw^o couples pivotin'. Talk about classic 
dancin', and the graceful movements of 
Isadore Duncan and Favlowa — say, if you 
ever seen Charlie and George and their 
gals, when they v/as hittin' up the redowa, 
you'd take off your hats and say that them dancers was the 
real dancin' pippins. 




55 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Frank DeWarf. 

Beau Brummel of Davenport Job Printers. 



56 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

That's about the time, sport, that the plughat epidemic 
was ragin' in this burg. High-rollin' dandies didn't think 
they was properly dolled unless crowned with the lids made 
famous by Rain-in-the-Face and other noble redmen who got 
saturated with firewater. The plughat was the high-sign of 
gentility and the comeon of the fourflush. 

Hiram Price set the fashion in lids with his sky-scrapin' 
beaver stovepipe. Michael Donahue and Senator Lowrey 
were natural-born plughatters, gettin' away clean with 'em, 
but Mose Zimmerman, Charlie Lindholm. Neighbor Carpen- 
ter, Joe Bettendorf, and Henry Volkman balked on sportin' 
the three-deck dicer, Harry Sommers, manager of the Kim- 
ball house, didn't feel dressed up unless a plughat topped his 
knob. Neither did Denny Hart, the head-waiter, Ed Purse, 
the bartender, nor Judge Shaughnessy, the barber. Other 
dandy dressers, sported the stovepipe and the soup-and-fish 
scenery, with and without the eggspot that 
is makin' evenin' clothes so popular with 
greek waiters. 

New Year's was callin' day, when some 
mighty fine old toppers chartered sea-goin* 
hacks to pay their respects to folks that run 
notices in The Democrat sayin' they would 
keep open house. Hot-punch and bubbles, 
oyster patties and hickorynuts, turkey and 
the trimmin's, was served, just the same 
as at popular free-lunch stations down town, 
the callers always wearin' stovepipe skim- 
mers. Sometimes a guy copped a nice fashionable stew in 
makin' them calls, but as he only tried to be sociable by 
stowin' away all the junk shoved in front of him, and didn't 
want to offend the hostess by tellin' her the cookin' was 
bum, he had a home-cooked alibi on the mornin' after, when 
he was nursin' a hangover. 

Some dashin' young swells played the free-lunch layout 
on the New Year's circuit, sport — guys like Harry Coventy, 
Charlie Griffith, Ernie Bennett, Billy Waddell, Sam Maxwell, 
Len Stockwell, Charlie Berryhill, Bert Dow, Frank Shelly, 
Mishie Borland, Billy Forrest, Charlie Putnam, Frank De- 




57 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

warf, Orrin Andrews, Carl Schlegel, Deacon White, Charlie 
Hagemann, Gough Grant, Dick Hill, Ben Tillinghast, Tom 
Swiney, Howard Henry, Ed Gifford, Ira Tabor, Quin 
Annable, Billy Elmer, Bert Conkright, Billy Lee, Al Meadley, 
Mer Parker, Walt Crandall, Nat Harris, Spicey Jones, and 
Vinegar Smith. 

Them boys had all the chesterfield stride, grace, and 
dignity that went with that callin* game, and, even if they 
used hairoil and waxed their mustashes, any respectable plug- 
hat felt honored to decorate their domes. 




58 




Rollicking Times at Wapsie Shindigs. 

We had fine social dances at Turner hall, 

Metropolitan hall, LeClaire hall, Lahr- 
mann's hall, Library hall, Kuehl's hall, and 
Moore's hall. In summertime the dancin' 
took place in the open, at Schuetzen park, 
Bornemann's garden, Hincher's garden, 
Washington garden, Pariser garden, Pete 
Jacobsen's, and out at Charlie Borcherdt's, 
Pete Wiese's, Maysville, Donahue, Walcott, 
Durant, Green Tree, LeClaire, the Fivemile 
house, and all the leadin' whistlin' stations. 
Hayrack and bobsled parties was popular then, not havin' 
flivvers nor interurbans to carry folks to goose raffles, duck 
dances, and corncrib hoedowns. 

The caller at the old time dances had more guts than 
a second lieutenant, the arrangements committee, and floor 
managers, and what he spilled was right outa the feedbox. 
John Cameron was high cockalorum, and when he rasped the 
openin' strains of a quadrille on the second fid, and shouted, 
"Salute yer partners!" everybody knew that the old master 
mechanic was on the job. 

Henry Schillinger was second choice of the callers, and 
when the dances came too thick around these diggin's, George 
Stroehle, of Rock Island, or Gus Wilson, of Moline. would be 
drafted into service. 

But it was at the country farmhouses that real old-fash- 
ioned shindigs were held. The farmer boys and gals jigged 
to lively tunes of the country fiddler, dancin' quadrilles and 
singin' old-time songs, after trashin' time, when the harvest 
days was over, Jessie dear. 

Early settlers in Winfield township, along the Wapsie, 
included the Maloneys, Gillens, Tyners, Dempseys, Duffys, 
Blooms, Armstrongs, Brennans, Carrols, Mullinos, Whalens, 
Ennises, Feeneys, McGuires, McNamaras, Gallaghers, 
Schmidts, Kivlins, Daughertys, Crowes, Murphys, Kellys, 



59 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Fresh-Air Club. 

Cruising along the Hennepin Canal. 



eo 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

O'Briens, and a lota other folks that didn't come from Sweden 
nor Czecho-Slovakia. Eamon de Valera and Countess Mar- 
kievicz couldn't never get away with them kinda names in 
Winfield township. 

The rubberin' historian on a hero chase amid the archives 
of the great State of Scott is astounded at the magnificent 
exhibit of deathless posterity that has sprung from the corn- 
fields along the banks of the Wapsie. Other states may 
boast of war heroes or graft-scarred vets of commercial battle- 
fields, but grand old Scott points its finger at animate and 
aggressive heroes whose names emblazon in letters big as box 
cars its scroll of fame. 

Look who's here, sport: 

Pat Crowe, author-actor, world's greatest kidnapper, 
born in Winfield township, on the banks of the Wapsie. 

Buffalo Bill, scout, world's greatest wildwest showman, 
born in Liberty township, on the banks of the Wapsie. 

Farmer Burns, rassler, world's greatest strangle-holt 
demonstrator, born in Butler township, on the banks of the 
Wapsie. 

Lillian Russell, opera star, world famous actress, born 
in Clinton county, on the banks of the Wapsie. 

That's steppin' some, you kin tell the world! 

Only one fiddler was needed at them dances, and he usta 
sing when callin' quadrilles, makin' up verses as he went 
along, while keepin' time with the music and dancin'. Jimmy 
Brennan was the star singin'-caller of Winfield township, but 
Niely Whalen was a young comer that was 
pressin' him close for first honors. 

When callin' to the tune of "The Girl 
I Left Behind Me," Jimmy's song would 
run sumpin like this : 

Now all four gents will lead to the right, 

Where four nice gals kin find you — 

Then balance all, and welt the floor, 
And swing that gal behind you. 

Jimmy sang through the quadrille, with 
the dancers laughin' and jiggin', and when 
they balanced-on-the-corners, and gave the grand-double- 




61 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

swing, them rosy-cheeked lasses got some swingin' that 
started their blood circulatin'. 

Mebbe, while a handout was bein' 
served, some thoughtful guy would happen 
to mention the little brown jug he brung 
out from Roddewig's on his last trip to town 
— that had sumpin in it that was "as mild 
as goat's milk." After the folks took a try 
at the refreshments, that was as mild as 
goat's milk, it seemed like sumpin happened 
that put new life in the party, and they'd 
start singin' that jolly old song about the 
"Little Brown Jug": 

If I had a cow that gave such milk 
I'd dress her up in satin and silk, 
Feed her on the choicest hay. 
And milk her forty times a day. 

Ha! ha! ha! You and me! 
Little brown jug, how I love thee! 

Then somebody would remember to call for Beezy 
Maloney to dance a jig — Beezy bein' so light on her feet she 
could balance a glass of water on her head and dance an Irish 
jig without spillin' a drop. Then, when Beezy raised her 
skirt to give her feet plenty of action, the fiddler would begin 
playin', and Beezy would get up on her toes and show the 
folks some real jiggin' that brought plenty of applause. 

Then Owney O'Brien and his woman, after a whole lota 
teasin' and coaxin', would take the floor to step off a reel, 
givin' all the fancy twists and turns, sashay in' and flirtin', 
bowin' and smilin', while Jimmy Brennan put in his best 
licks playin' "Mrs. McLeod's Reel." 

That dance would lead up to call for a bit of a song, 
and Dominick Gillin would be ast would he sing "My Molly, 
O!" It took a whole lot of coaxin' and palaverin' to get 
Dominick wound up, for he would try to excuse hisself by 
sayin': "Bad cess t' me, but th' divil a word can I ray- 
memiber, at all at all." But after the folks demanded, and 
insisted, and wouldn't listen to no excuse, Dominick would 
clear his throat and cough a coupla times, and then start 
singin' in a slow, tremulous comealye voice: 



62 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Whin Oi wint out wan morenin', 

'Twas in the month of May, 
Oi met a pritty Oirish gerril. 

And unto her Oi did say. 
Oi put me hand into me pocket 

And it happened to be so 

Sure Oi tuck me goolden guinea 

For to trait me Molly, O! 

As Dominick warmed to his work he grew more confid- 
ent, and his voice became clearer, stronger, louder, and when 
everybody in the party joined in with him while singin' the 
last line — "For to tr'at me Molly, O!" — you could hear that 
chorus way over at Ground Mound in Clinton county. 

"More power, Dominick, an' long life t' ye!" a young 
Gallagher lad would shout. 

"Ha-Ha! 'Tis Dominick that has the foine v'ice!" one 
of the little Armstrong gals would declare. 

Then the merry chorus of "Little Brown Jug'" would be 
repeated, havin' a whole lot more pep this time, and young 
Paddy Murphy would start the call for California Pat to 
show the young b'ys and gerrils how he usta dance a real 
Irish jig in the Ould Country. Havin' been lookin' on quietly 
and listenin' attentively to the others, while smokin' his pipe 
contentedly in the corner, California Pat became all flustered, 
and acted sheepishly and embarrassed, as he begged to be 
excused. 

"Arrah, hiven bless yez!" he pleaded, bashfully. "Sure'n 
I haven't putt a futt t' th' fluur since th' 
christenin' av Moike Dimpsey's son Garge." 
But there was no stoppin' the call for 
California Pat, once it started, and though 
be was proof against all entreaty and coax- 
in', it was plain he was nettled and annoyed 
by the taunts of Charlie DuflFy, who "dared 
him to dance a jig, sayin' that he couldn't 
dance like he usta back in the Ould Coun- 
try, or he wouldn't "take water" before all 
the neighbors. The taunts of Charlie Duffy 
had the effect of bringin' California Pat 
to life unexpectedly, for he stood up and declared that "The 
Duffy niver breathed that cud make a Brinnin take water." 




63 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

To think that he, California Pat — who had suffered the 
privations and hardships of that terrible overland journey to 
California in an ox-drawn prairie schooner with the old 
forty-niners, and, with the hard-earned gold he wrested from 
the eternal hills concealed in his belt, had taken a sailin' 
vessel to the Isthmus of Panama, and then hoofed it over the 
mountains on the return trip, to buy his coveted eighty acres 
in Winfield township — should take a "dare!" And from a 
Duffy ! 

Wurra! Wvirra! 'Twas more than mortal man could 
stand ! 

Boundin' to the middle of the room suddenly, California 
Pat jumped high, swingin' his arms wildly and slappin' his 
chest forcefully, as he shouted: "Hur-roo, b'ys! Long live 
Oireland and County Kilkenny, and may th' divil mend th' 
connuckmin', wan and all! Jimmy, me b'y — play the 
'Flowers of Edinburg,' till yer fa-ather shows th' heavy- 
heeled Duffys how a Brinnin can dance a r'al Irish jig!" 

And California Pat had a dash of fire in his heels that 
night, for he danced a real Irish jig, just like he usta dance 
when a boy back in County Kilkenny in the Ould Country, 
where he won manny's the prize in the dancin' contests at 
the country fairs. 

Whether it was the goat's milk from the little brown jug, 
or the naggin' of a Duffy, that started the ancestral fires 
bumin' in the breast of that hardy old pioneer, is small matter, 
but the likes of that jig was never seen before nor since in 
Winfield township. 

California Pat shouted as he danced, leapin' high as Jhe 
ceilin', crackin' his heels and weltin' the f^oor with his 
brogans, till the rafters shook and the dishes rattled, while 
the prism pendants of the hangin' lamp in the parlor clattered 
to the rollickin' strains of the "Flowers of Edinburg." The 
fervor of his parent was reflected in young Jimmy Brennan, 
as the fiddle-bow skimmed merrily over the strings, and the 
honor of County Kilkenny was upheld in a fascinatin' concord 
of movement between sire and son. 

There was haughty defiance mingled with kindly pity, 
directed toward Charlie Duffy, in every movement of the 



64 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

excited dancer, and an expression of fine contempt for all 
doubters spread over his sturdy, handsome features. 

When California Pat finished dancin' that Irish jig, 
Charlie Duffy, on behalf of the Duffys, one and all, present 
and absent, apologized profusely for havin' entertained any 
doubt about the jig dancin' ability of California Pat, and, as 
he grasped his friend's hand, he shook it warmly, sayin' that 
now he knew for sure that a Brennan would never take a 
"dare." 

At sunup the next mornin', while the young lads slept 
soundly under the eaves, California Pat, with sleeves rolled 
up to his sun-tanned shoulders, was sloppin' the hogs and 
feedin' the chickens. He smiled good-humoredly as he sur- 
veyed the corn that was ripenin' over in the east forty, while 
he crooned softly to himself that homely ould chune, "My 
Molly, O!" — for it plaised California Pat immensely to know 
for sure, for all time and forever, that "The Duffy niver 
breathed that cud make a Brinnin take water." 




65 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Toot I Toot! The Seventy-two I 

Connie O'Brien and the Kilkenny ci'ew ! 



66 



When the Eclipse Threw a Scare. 



AY, BOB— Ever heard about 
the big eclipse us old timers 
had back in the early sev- 
enties? Well, that was a 
whale of a big show, and 
they ain't been nothin' like 
J it pulled around here since. 
It came along about three 
o'clock in the afternoon, 
and everything went dark 
as pitch for half an hour. 
Schools closed so's the kids 
could run home before dark, 
and folks hadta light the 
gas at Stevenson and Car- 
nahan's. Whistler's, Schom- 
berg and Evans's, and at all 
the other big, hustlin' stores. 
People was all nervoused up 
and stood mopin' around 
and takin' their peekin's at 
the eclipse through smoked glasses, wonderin' what was goin' 
to happen, and, if some live kidder had blasted a loud snort 
through a trombone, folks would of thought that old Gabriel 
was primin' his trumpet for the blowoff solo. They certainly 
was keyed up to a high pitch of excitement. 

The chickens clucked and the geese quacked, and then 
went to roost like on regular evenin's, and just about the 
time that snoozin' was gettin' snooky the rooster crowed 
all hands on deck, and that poultry outfit thought sure that 
things was gettin' twisted. 

Nancy, the old roan hoss of little Billy McFarland, the 
expressman, was the most surprised nag in town, Billy get- 
tin' balled up in his dates and givin' old Nance an extra 
feed of oats. 




67 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Matthias Frahm, Bernhard Eseke, Dick Shebler, Henry 
Korn, and Fritz Paulsen was argufyin' about the barley mar- 
ket and the price of hops at Fifth and Harrison, when Old 
Sol went off watch, and when they broke for cover, up 
to the summerhouse, old Ed had the big brass lamp lit, 
and them boys took a dutch treat, and switched their gab 
from food to astronomy. 

Connie O'Brien came steamin' in with a way freight 
from Brooklyn, with Pat Riley shovelin' black diamonds 
into old engine seventy-two. Jimmy O'Meara was the front 
brakesy and Barney Costello was the con that perched in the 
little red caboose when Connie whistled down brakes and 
stopped the train at Harrison street, alongside Dow, Gil- 
man, and Hancock's elevator, so's the Riley boy could touch 
up the kerosene 1,1^"^ i^ ^he ingine headlight. 

All them laddybucks on that train crew was from 
old County Kilkenny, exceptin' Zee McMahon, the second 
brakesy, he bein' from Donegal, or one of them north coun- 
ties. And them boys knowed more about handlin' freight 
trains than Mose Hobbs, or Seth Twombley^ or any of them 
wise-crackers that was wearin' paper collars and makin' out 
reports in the old Farnam. street roundhouse. 

That's when Zee McMahon usta sing : 

Binkem! Bunkem! My old hen! 
She lays eggs for railroad men. 
Sometimes eight and sometimes ten — 
Binkem! Bunkem! My old hen! 

Understand, sport, in them days the brakesys and con 
hadta do hand-brakin', runnin' from car to car and twistin' 
the brakes, not havin' no boghead sittin in the cab to put 
the clampers on with a shot of juice. Brakesys and switch- 
men coupled cars with their bare mitts, and a regular hard- 
boiled railroader was always shy a coupla fingers from seein' 
how long he could hold his hand between the bumpers with- 
out gettin' ketched when makin' a couplin'. 

Purty cushy for engineers now'days, with airbrakes and 
electric lights. But, even at that, sport, them old timers 
could jerk the throttle on the old ingine and pep her up so's 



68 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

she'd throw a bunch of shotes or yearlin' steers further than 
any of these guys with all their electricity and modern inir 
provements. 

People was scared stiff about that eclipse, as in them 
days folks believed in ghosts, goblins, banshees, and fairies, 
and in payin' their debts. Now'days they think they're too 
wise for that old bunk, but a lota Barnum's one-a-minute 
yaps are still with us, and are ducksoup for oilstockers. 
socialists, and easy-money pirates, just the same. A little 
mushy con about ten-per-cent-a-month 
stuff, and them open-and-shut guys can 
take 'em for their underclothes. 

In them times lovey and dovey 
dreamed about the hardcoal burner and 
horsehair furniture for the parlor, with 
a kerosene hangin' lamp havin' a flock 
of prism-glass dewdads danglin' around 
the dome, and makin' a noise like a 
rock-crusher while bein' pulled down for 
lightin'. But now'days lovey and dovey 
dope up on stucco bungalov/s, sun parlors, and sport-model 
roadsters, with fathead father for the fallguy. And they 
aint got noodle enough to think of goin' out in the woods 
and livin' in trees with the other squirrels. 

But mebbe the squirrels is gettin' particular, 
Fritz Haller usta throw in a chunk of liver with a ten- 
cent soup-bone, and he'd slip you enough dogmeat on the 
side to keep the family fed up on hash for two days. 

When little gals played with their dollies they wore 
long dresses so's they' look like their mammas, printers 
could tell a comma from a bobtail flush, and boilermakers 
could ride on the waterwagon all through lent without battin' 
an eyelash. 

Granger Wallace usta play "Nancy Lee" on the mouth- 
organ and his little sister accompanied him with the jews- 
harp, and that little team of blondies had it all over these 
nut-eyed uke twangers that is makin' the earache a popular 
malady now'days. 



69 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

When spring came around and dandelions began bloom- 
in', in them days, sport, folks took sulphur and molasses with 
cream of tartar, or a shot of salts and senna, to cool their 
blood that had got overheated from feedin' up on buck- 
wheats, flannelcakes, and pork sausage durin' the winter. 
Doctors told 'em to hit up rhubarb sauce, mush and milk, 
cornbread, and green onions, to cool their blood for the dog- 
days. There's a smart hunch for lady members of the cold- 
feet club, and for old codgers that sleep under six blankets: 
Stoke UD on buckwheats and hotdogs, .md put heat under 
the belt. Lay off the rhubarb and onions. Heat the blood 
to concert pitch, and next summer dance the shimmy and 
do high divin' at that new swimmin' joint that's bein' built 
by hand down on the levee. 




70 




Slick Skaters and Sweet Singers. 

Say, sport — You don't know 
nothin' about the old days when we 
usta play checkers for excitement on 
winter evenin's in the corner grocery 
— back in the times when Cash Wat- 
son was the champeen ice-skate 
jumper — do you? That's goin' back 
purty far, boy — back to the skatin' 
park of Collins and Casette, between 
Brady and Main on Seventeenth, when screwheel club skates 
first came into style, and when all the young fellers and their 
gals had the skatin' fever in its worst form. 

Of course. Cash Watson was the original rough-ridin' 
ice-skater, and when he took to jumpin', all the others took a 
back seat. When it came to fancy trick and graceful skatin', 
though, Miley Blakemore stood at the top of the heap, and 
he performed with the speed of a greyhound and the grace 
of a gazelle. 

But you kin tell the world they ain't been no real ice- 
skate jumpin' since Cash hung up his world's record by 
jumpin' over twenty old-fashioned school benches. 

That's what Cash done, sport. Started out to jump 
over ten, and ended by breakin' the record. Just slipped a 
dime wad of finecut into his left cheek, done some circlin', 
took a tailspin and nosedive, got a flyin' start and — zowie! 
Cleaned twenty benches like a tomcat would clean a canary. 
Now'days a lota hotdogs gets peeved for not gettin' 
credit for doin' a little peanut business for the old burg. 
Just so's they won't be no squabblin' about who gets credit 
for Cash Watson's ice-skate jump, you kin say the benches 
was borryed from Jake Nagel, principal of the Locust street 
school, and the guys that carted them benches was Henry 
Randall, Teedee Eagal, Lee Valentine, Brick Bryan, George 
Strong, Tom Sherman, Jim Houghton, Boney Mack, Hoosier 
Osborn, Gus Koester, Duck Wilsey, Frank Balch, Joe Har- 



71 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



rington, Pete Remine, Charlie Booth, Roy Keyset, Will Hos- 
ford, Al Winkless, Charlie Hibbard, and Tador Kuehl. 
Nothin' like keepin' the record straight, sport. 
I don't suppose you ever heard of Jack Powers and his 
little brother Mickey, that usta light the gas lights on the 
lamp-posts on downtown corners. Jack carried the ladder 
and would lean it against the lamp-post and Mickey would 
climb up and light the gas with his torch. On evenin's 
when they was a little scrappin' to be done. Free McMahon 
and Badger Cottrell helped 'em do the lightin'. Then about 
three o'clock in the mornin' the Powers kids went around 
and doused the glims, and they split three bucks a week 
for doin' this work. Pretty soft, huh? 

When the circus was billed, kids usta scout the alleys 
for magnesia bottles to sell at Harrison and Holman's drug 
store. Them there was the original Boy Scout drives. Mr. 
Harrison always had a nickel to slip a kid for a magnesia 
bottle, and then if the kid played in luck sellin' scrap iron 
to old Jake, and could run a few errands for a penny, he'd 
be all settin' pritty on circus day. Kids would run their 
legs off doin' errands for a penny then, but now'days it 
takes a dime or a quarter to get them to step on their starters. 
You young fellers is excused for not knowin' good sing- 
in', never havin' heard Jim Dermody, Tom 
Biddison, Joe Carroll, and Tommie Mack 
doin' close harmony at Johnny McGuin- 
ness's. 

That quartet put more zip into songs 
than the guy that wrote 'em ever dreamed 
about. They sang all them smooth old 
timers, like "Larboard Watch," "Silver 
Threads," "Sweet Genevieve," "Daisy 
Dean," "Swanee Ribber," and "Cahve Dat 
Possum," and when they tipped over "The 
Old Oaken Bucket" there wasn't a dry 
throat in the joint. 
Then there was Doc Worley, at the livery barn at Fifth 
and Brady. Doc could spiel tenor, bass or falsetto, and plunk 




72 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

the guitar like a Spanish cavalier. He played in C major 
and A minor, with capo on the fifth fret, and could grab all 
them naughty barber chords for the high spots, and do the 
bass runs to a frazzle. 

On moonlight evenin's Doc hitched up the team of bays 
to his best landau, lowered the top, and invited the quartet 
to go serenadin', pickin' up Lawrie the Coon, with his deep- 
cellar bass. Comin' back to the barn they always gave a 
concert to the big crowd that was waitin', and Lawrie would 
dance the "Gawgie Essence" on the board sidewalk. 

Doc Worley sang Emmett's "Lullaby" and "Cuckoo 
Song" and warbled as sweetly as J. K. himself, and when he 
trilled "Sweet Peggy O'Moore" you'd never know it wasn't 
W. J. Scanlon. Nov/'days young fellers twang the uke and 
sing "Ain't We Got Fun," "All By Myself," "In Sunny Ten- 
nessee." 

Some evenin's, after trimmin' Billy Catton and Lanny 
Macaffee at shark pool down at Lewy 
Boquillion's, Max Ochs would join up 
and try his mellow baritone voice on 
"Moonlight on the Lake," with the help 
of the quartet, the chorus, and the Coon. 
Across the street, in front of Dave Hunter's market, 
enjoyin' the concert, you'd find Granny Conyer — Lawrie's old 
mammy — and old Aunt Lucy, two fine cullud types of the 
old slavery days. And, along about ten o'clock, when Granny 
began to nod and grow sleepy, she would interrupt the merry- 
makers by callin' over: 

"Come 'long heah, yo' Law'nce Conyeh! 'Bout time 
yo' was totin' home with youah ol' Granny, an' not singin' 
all ebenin' fo' dem white folkses, 'ca'se they don't want fo' 
to 'sociate with no cullud trash. So come on 'long heah, 
Law'nce, fo' I'se done gwine home. 'Sides I'se got a poweh- 
ful lahge washin' to staht soakin' fo' de mohnin' !" 
And Lawrie would reply: 
"Yas-sum, Granny — yas-sum — I'se a-comin'!" 
Then while the colored trio walked homeward the sere- 
naders would join in the chorus, "Carry Me Back to Ol' 
Virginny." 



73 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Say, boy! That Ol' Virginny song sholy did make light 
steppin' fo' dem cullud folkses. 

Aunt Lucy lived in the basement of the cullud church 
at Fourth and Gaines, after she had grown too old to make 

the rounds as washerwoman. 
When Cleveland was elected, 
there was lotsa kiddin' with 
the cullud folks, the story 
bein' circulated that if a 
democrat got elected presi- 
dent all the old slaves would 
be sent back to the cotton 
fields. Sam McClatchey met 
Aunt Lucy after the election, 
and ast her what she thought 
about Cleveland, and if she 
was gettin' ready to go back 
to Alabama. Aunty had other 
worries about that time, for she shifted the red bandana on 
her head and told about Johnny Schmidt, the county poor- 
master, bein' overdue in his coal dates. * 

"Ah aint bothe'in' ma haid 'bout who done got 'lected, 
chile. What Ah is bothe'd 'bout is when Mistah SmifT is 
gwine to delivah ma wintah coal. Go 'long now, Sammy, 
'bout yo' ol' 'lectium, an' don' fool yo' ol' aunty. What Ah 
wants, 'stid of 'lectium, is mo' cohnmeal, bacon, an' 'tatehs 
fo' de col' wintah mohnin's." 

But there were always a few kind white folks to look 
after the simple needs of old Aunt Lucy. 

Lemme tell you, sport — them was the good old days! 
Kids usta spit for good luck when they'd spot a red- 
headed gal, and then they'd look for the white boss before 
makin' a wish. Now'days they need to be some spitters 
with all these henna-headed babies floatin' around. And, 
bein' as they aint no more white bosses, they're outa luck 
unless they wish sumpin' on a yaller cab or ford coop. 

Barney Reddy played ''Molly Darlin'," "Down in a Coal 
Mine," and "Sweet Evalina" on the wheezy hand-organ for 
the boss-power merry-go-round at the old Fair grounds. 



74 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




where you now got Vander Veer park. The lucky hick that 
grabbed the brass ring from the ringrack, while buzzin' 
around, was entitled to another spin free. 

Jakey Heinsfurter was learnin' to waltz and two-step 
with the good-lookin' young gals at the Thalia maskenball and 

the Sawmill boys' social. Jakey 
never did learn, his dogs bein' 
church-broke, but he had more darn 
fun practicin' down there and at the 
Friedegg and the Dirty Dozen 
social. He danced mostly with his 
arms and shoulders, but his hoofs 
wouldn't register. Jakey was jake 
to this nineteen twenty-two dancin' 
stuff, but the folks didn't know it. 
Many a little gal had to have her 
corns pared after a friendly dancin' 
bout around the hall with Jakey. 
When gals was homely they knowed it, and learned to 
be wallflowers, so's they could hold a man when they hooked 
him. Now'days they open beauty parlors and shoot the 
con and other chemicals into pinhead broads — tellin' 'em their 
dresses is too long, givin' 'em Spanish treatment for their 
double chins, and coachin' 'em in eye-rollin', so's they'll look 
like baby dolls. 

That's when Carpenter Drake had a split-up with Ben 
Coates, his old sidekick, because Ben blowed the carpenter 
trade and took up the tar roof business. Carpenter Drake 
frankly confessed that the tar roof knowed more about Ben 
Coates than Ben Coates knowed about the tar roof. Car- 
penter was the original keenkutter kid, built on the sparerib 
plan, five-foot-one in his socks, and he cracked the scales for 
one-twenty. He had sorrel whiskers and usta eat peanuts 
when lappin' his brew, and he'd keep singin', "You can't 
have any of my peanuts when your peanuts are gone." Never 
a peep out of Carpenter till he got well lubricated, then his 
gabber started sparkin' and he'd say, "Listen, fellers — never 
steal a mule when there's a runnin' boss in the next stall." 



75 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




All Dolled for Easter Sunday Style Parade. 
San Harrison and Nick Buck. 



76 




Highheel Boots and Bellbottom Pants. 

Let me tell you, sport, these Hotstove leaguers don't 
know nothin' about natural baseball — the game played by 
hand, not by machinery, Now'days, with shinguards, chest- 
protectors, mitts, masks, spikes, and other tools, a ball-player 
looks like a warrior bold startin' out on stick-up duty. 

Why, the old timers played with bare knuckles, and could 
do their stuff with bare feet in a pinch. First bounce was 

out — so was over the fence. The 
em.pire hadta watch his step, and 
they wasn't no beanin' nor spik- 
in'. The pitcher done underhand 
pitchin' — not throwin' — and the 
catcher took 'em on first bounce. 
They played scrub and one-ol'- 
cat for money, marbles, or chalk, and they would fight at the 
drop of a hat. 

Ever heard of that crack all-star nine of kid players in 
the old days, the Enterprise club? 

Some team, sport — some ball team. Trained on Gris- 
wold college grounds, with Professor Sheldon and Professor 
Brooks for coachers. 

Had the original stonewall infield — Hiram Dillon on 
first, Jim Preston on second, George Preston on third, and 
George W. French at short. In the outfield Buck Layden 
played right. Max Ochs center, and Billy Meese left. Harry 
Glaspell done the pitchin' and Joe Lane the catchin'. 

The Enterprise club cleaned up everything in the base- 
ball line in Western Illinois and Eastern Iowa, and then went 
to LeClaire to trim the Brown Stockin's. 

That game, for the championship of Scott county, was 
pulled in Hanley's pasture, v/ith Billy Chamberlin empirin'. 
Score sixty-eight to thirteen, for the Enterprisers. The 
audience of thirty-three included Captain Wes Rambo, of 
the Steamer Libby Conger and his crev/, not countin' a herd 
of steers in the next pasture. 



77 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Understand, sport, them LeClaire bugs was rank home- 
towners and couldn't swoUy the trimmin' their boys got 
without framin' to even up things. 

Nobody knows how the Enterprise ball- 
players got to LeClaire that day, but everybody 
knowed that walkin' was fair to middlin'. So 
when Captain Wes Rambo ast them would they 
like to ride back on the Libby Conger they said 
sure thing. After they got planted comfortably 
on the boat the Cap gave the highsign to start, 
but he stopped the Libby about twenty feet from 
shore and showed his loyalty to LeClaire by 
tellin' them Enterprise boys he'd changed his 
mind and guessed they'd better walk to Davenport. He 
talked in straight steamboat language, without no ifs, nor 
ands, nor buts. He gave 'em five seconds to jump off the 
boat, and to show that he wasn't kiddin' the old fire-eater 
yelped a wild, injun warwhoop, jerked his hip cannon, and 

busted her three times in 
the air. 

Hi Dillon drew first 
water, but Jim Preston beat 
him to shore. Billy Meese 
and Buck Layden was tied 
for third place, with the 
other Enterprisers steppin' 
on their heels. 

Then Captain Wes hol- 
lered and ast them boys how 
many tallies they scored in 
that innin', and he blowed 
the whistle for the Libby 
Conger to start downstream. 
By that time, sport, them 
champion ballplayers was 
all outa pep from runnin' 
around bases and pullin' for 
the shore in their swinwnin' 




78 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

contest, so they stretched out to dry under the old elm tree. 
Harry Glaspell knowed an easy-pickin' livery stable guy that 
owned a picnic hack, and Harry coaxed him to hitch up and 
drive the Enterprise champions to East Davenport. 

Them was the days when swell dressers wore high-top 
boots with three-inch heels. Lew Davis sported the finest 
calfskin boots that Robert Murdock could make, but Lew 
didn't have nothin' on Charlie Benton, Chet Lorton, Jack 
Munro, Mick McCrellias, nor any of them freight engineers 
or conductors on the Rock Island, when it come right down 
to class in high-heel boots. 

That's where the wimmen folks got this french-heel idea 
— they copped from the boobs that staked 'em to the rib. 
Now'days men is lucky if they wear fly-dick heels that need 
attention from a greek heel straightener. 

Men didn't wear trousers then — only pants. And when 
they wore 'em creased the kids usta holler "Hand-me-down!" 
When a young feller graduated from roughneck society 
and broke out as a dude, he'd slip into a paper collar and 
visit Bartemier's clothin' store and get measured for sporty 
three-dollar black jeans pants with twenty-two inch bell- 
bottoms. They fit his legs as tight as blony sausage and he 
hadta use a shoe-horn to slide into 'em. Then he'd put up 
his best front and spiel a song-and-dance to Jules Guillyo, 

the old frog shoemaker, and hook 
him for a pair of made-to-order 
high-heel low-quarter shoes, agree- 
in' to come through with the coin 
on payday night. Isaac Rothschild 
was the next mark to get nicked — 
for the red socks and the red neck- 
tie. Then Ed Ryan would get the 
hurryup for the lid, one of them 
lowbridge potboiler kellys that bal- 
anced on his ears, the kind that yid 
comedians is still using in vaude- 
ville. 
Then, bein' all set, this ladykillin' proposition would 
parade Second street on Sunday afternoon to give free eye 



79 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

entertainment to the dames that wore bustles, opera hats, 
and bangs, and was steerin' for Shuler' tintype gallery to 
have their pichers took. 

Ever know, sport, who was the first guy to use poetry 
in his newspaper ads? Why, when Ed Ryan operated his 
hat joint at Second and Main, he had a ten-foot plughat above 
the door for a comeon for ginks that was lookin' to be 
properly crowned, and Ed usta run ads in The Democrat 
tellin' these blobs what was screwy about their makeup and 
how they'd been bumped by other hat guys with the wrong 
steer, and he doped it that when they was out for class in 
bean covers to visit 

Ryan the hatter — 
That's w^hat's the matter. 

And from that innocent beginnin', sport, has sprung up 
the big herd of ad writers that uses poetry in these days to 
knock business. 

In them times Hirschl Debattie sold 
stogie twofers that you could inhale without 
slappin' a piaster on the back of your neck. 
Now you get sacked for a thin dime for a 
fireproof torch that no old-time democrat 
would hand to a republican, even at a 
national election. 

Doctors prescribed quinine powders with whiskey for 
the grippe, and lotsa guys got so's they could take the 
whiskey without the quinine — after a little practice. Novv'- 
days the bugs gargle white mule that tastes worse than 
quinine without the whiskey, but carries a stiffer wallop. 

When the guy with the scythe fell down on the job 
in the old days, tight old codgers kept stickin' around, just 
to kid the folks that was achin' for the knockoff so's they 
could shoot his jack. Now'days an operation is framed, and 
the tightwad gets the skiv. 

Sam Lucas came to town with the Heyer Sisters, and 
made a hit singin' "Grandfather's Clock." Folks said that 
song was more'n fifty years old at that time. Now, when the 
Rotary and Kiwanis clubs want to liven up, they wind 



80 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

"Grandfather's Clock" or clink water glasses for that other 
old timer, ''Jingle Bells." 

Not throwin' the hammer, understand, but some guy 
on your sheet is short-changin' on market reports. Course, 
you're keen on Liverpool grain, Chicago bull, and St. Louis 
mule, but Peoria has blooied. In the old days, standin' out 
like breakfast egg on a travelin' man's chin, was the Peoria 
market — "Whiskey, steady and unchanged, @ $1.10." That 
@ $1.10 wasn't for a shot, nor a drugstore short pint, but 
for a gallon of bourbon that a guy could swolly without 
stranglin'. 

Here's your hunch, sport — boost the town as the great- 
est market for hooch, white mule, and home brew. Tell the 
world our leggers stretch a gallon of Johnny Walker to five 
gallons by dopin' it with raisin soup and alk, that our moon- 
shiners make five-year squirrel in five days, and our good- 
lookin' kitchen chemists distil knockout dandelion wine in 
two weeks. 

Bein' as them birds at the city hall has stopped Volstead 
and come clean for wine and brew, the stage is set for a 
big killin'. 

You newspaper boys may be leery about playin' the car- 
toon and the harpoon, but you kin put plenty of smoke on, 
them hooch market reports without bein' called on the carpet. 




81 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Captain Walter Blair's Palatial Steamboat. 

Where Tri-City Press Club held frolic. 



82 




With the Boys of Company B. 

Say, Bob — We had some humdinger parades in this burg 
in the old days, startin' in the early seventies with the day- 
light hossback parade of the butchers and drovers, led by 
that roughridin' cowboy, Kd Mueller, with his 
long hair, sombrero, spurs, chapps, buckin' 
broncho, and badlands mustash. Then there 
was Bill Korn and his Pretzel alley press club 
parade, with all the reporters, editorial staff, 
and war correspondents of the Pretzel Alley 
Wurst-Blatt — includin' Hizzoner Mayor Alec 
Anderson and Poet Lariat Barney Squires — 
all made up to life and ready for the pichers. 
That's when the world's heavyweight cham- 
pionship battle. Jack Johnson versus the White Man's Hope, 
was staged at Credit island at the Tri-City press club frolic, 
after Captain Walter Blair had entertained the elite of the 
Tri-cities at evenin' tea on his palatial steamboat, the Morn- 
in' Star, with the help of the captain and crew of the steam- 
boat Beder Wood of Moline. 

We had protest percessions for freein' old Ireland in them 
times, and for warnin' snoopy government guys against the 
folly of tryin' to flim the Germans outa their beverage in 
our Glorious and Independent State of Scott County. But 
the turnout that made all other parades look like peanut 
affairs was the Belva Lockwood pageant of Company B, 
when them boys had got the rep of bein' the crack militia 
company of the West. 

In them times, sport, wimmen wasn't keen for crackin' 
into politics, as they was kept busy at home, playin' wash- 
board solos, doin' plain and fancy cookin', and refereein' bat- 
tles for a yardful of kids. Regardin' kale drives, wearin' 
boudoir bonnets in fords in the daytime, polite panhandlin', 
and uplift hokum, there was nothin' stirrin'. 

This Belva dame, bein' the first female entry in the 
race for president, and the starter of wimmen on the high- 



83 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Ted Neuhaus in Belva Lockwood Costume. 



84 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

heel road to freedom, naturally the gallant young sojers 
of Company B lined up for her. They arranged a whang- 
doodle torchlight percession for that gal that beat anything 
ever put over for Cleveland and Hendricks or Blaine and 
Logan, with all their marchin' clubs, flambeau clubs, drum 
corps, tin caps, oilcloth capes, leaky kerosene torches, and 
mounted hicks from Blue Grass and the corn belt. 

That's when them Ole-and-Axel marchin' clubs from 
Moline was shipped over in cattle cars, with galesburg snoos 
and their full-dinnerpail lanterns, to misstep in the parade 
and yammer in march time, "Plaine! Plaine! Yames Yee 
Plaine!" Them's the guys that put the indian sign on the 
Plumed Knight and Black Eagle. 

When Company B started anything they always fin- 
ished, and them sojers went the route for Belva — dollin' in 
regular Belva style, with long dresses, steelframe corsets, 
banged hair, poke-bonnets, and balloon bustles. Exceptin' 
actresses, wimmen in them times didn't smear the powder, 
paint, and calcimine, use the lipstick, and fight the lookin'- 
glass like they do now. 

Highprivate Harry Fulton was the ace that played the 
Belva part, and that bird showed top class as a leader, with 
four prime pippins — Clyde Riley, Brick Ogden, Vic Skiles, 
and Sojer Davis — as escorts. Then came Private Ted Neu- 
haus, Belva's runnin' mate, the lady candidate for vice-pres- 
ident, and Ted was the swellest dressed trimmie in that 
turnout. Private Lib Graham v»7as next in line, as the lady 
drum major, twirlin' a kitchen broom for baton and directin' 
Strasser's full band, all ribboned and pinked in comin'-out 
dresses. 

The officers, headed by Private Litz Warriner as flag- 
bearer, trailed the band, Captain Ed Cameron and Lieuten- 
ants Billy McCullough and Billy Gilbert doin' female mili- 
tary duty, with hoopskirts, wide-spreadin' opera hats, and 
bustles. The First Big Four, a quartet of cornfed huskies, 
followed — Charlie Coen, Billy Stroehle, Bob Russell, and 
Billy Purcell. The Inside Four, that ast no odds from no- 
body, came next — Johnny Quinn, Ed Randolph, Earl Nichols, 
and Bump Mossman. Then the Sawedoff Four, squatty 



85 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

and quick-steppin' — Frank Snell, Jim Kough, Frank Valen- 
tine, and Johnnie McGee. 

There wasn't a pigeon-breast on the roster of privates 
that wore dresses and carried jap-lanterns and umbrellas to 
make the march for Belva — only sturdy gladiators, like 
Frank Parmele, Ed Kough, Sam Laflferty, Emil Hass, Her- 
man Stolle, Charlie Osborn, Dalt Risley, Max Robinson. Cap 
White, Billy Davidson, Charlie Cameron, Lee Clark, Billy 
Oakes, Cliff Reid, Charlie Hubbell, Billy Speer, Dan Lyon, 
Al Muckle, Layt Ackley, Jake Matteson, Frank Porter, Roy 
Matthews, Tom Hanley, Enoch Wood, Jim Gannon, Vince 
Dorgan, Cap Nelson, Morris Fort, John Helmick, George 
Curtis, George Davis, Bert Durfee, Ben Garrett, Ike Gray, 
Billy Devinney, Erv Kemmerer, Frank Mitchell, Chet Pratt, 
Jim Robeson, Otto Smith, John Streeper, Jake Matteson, 
Al Shorey, Lew Wild, Billy Carney, Johnny McGee, Mar- 
tin Oakes, Max Robinson, Meese Berg, Bob Kulp, John 
Dolan, Frank Taylor, George Jones, George Eldridge, George 
Fay, Doctor Jimmy Tomson, and Pus LeClaire. 

Visitors from the country jammed the streets, and Bar- 
num's circus and hippodrome never brought more parade 
bugs to town. After marchin' the downtown streets, all lit up 
with greek fire and fireworks, the parade halted at Third and 
Perry, where Belva delivered a most magnolious address on 
Woman's Rights, lefts, and uppercuts, from the balcony of 
the old Central hotel. That famous speech aint never been 
equaled in any political campaign to this day, even by 
George Scott, Buck Hamann, Billy Maines, Willum O. 
Schmidt, Lew Roddewig, Harry McFarland, or any other 
member of the silver-tongued order of spread-eagles. 

Mebbe you boys aint next that Company B was the 
whole smear, and when big stuff needed a push they was in 
the game up to their elbows. The military ball at Metropoli- 
tan hall made a bigger stir with the natives than Bobby 
Bums's festival, the Volunteer Fireman's masquerade, or the 
East Davenport Turnverein kaffeeklatch. 

Some big guns hooked up with the B outfit — men like 
General Lyman Banks, Colonel Henry Egbert, Colonel Park 
McManus, Colonel George French, Major Morton Marks, 



86 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Major George McClelland, and Lieutenant August Reimers. 
When them old war hosses spoke folks took notice. The 
B boys usta drill in the old market house, and later they 
built the armory, now g.h.q. for the Legion boys. 

Why, sport, when the state offered a stand of arms as a 
prize to the two best-drilled companies, one from each 
brigade, Company B copped in the first brigade right off the 
reel. They then challenged the Governor's Grays of Dubuque, 
second brigade winners, and cleaned 'em in jigtime at Mar- 
shalltown. They taught a lota new tricks to the Rodman 
Rifles of Rock Island, and when the National Rifles of Wash- 
ington barnstormed the West, the B boys escorted 'em on 
their visit to the Arsenal, and took charge of affairs at their 
exhibition drill at the Fair grounds. 

When the crepe-hangers from the high-grass counties 
put prohibition over, things looked awful dry for the B boys 
as they strapped on their knapsacks and headed for the 
encampment at Centerville. But the night before startin', a 
coupla wet sojers was inhalin' brew and pretzels at Frahm's 
and mournin' over the dry outlook with Henry Frahm, when 
that good old scout tipped 'em on how they could save a few 
lives out in the desert country. 

On the second day in camp two trucks with barrels 
marked "Beattie's XXX Hard Winter Wheat Flour" rumbled 
into B headquarters, and when them barrels was tapped with 
a wooden faucet liquid flour with a white collar bubbled out 
into tin cups, and the big drouth at the encampment was 
busted. 

The Captain passed samples of that flour to the officers 
of the other companies, and B g.h.q. was the popular spot 
of Centerville. Then the Cap got mildly inoculated with 
fluid flour and the bright idea of givin' a banquet to the 
regimental officers. Callin' Privates Joe Frazer and George 
Gillette, he told 'em the visitin' officers had a weakness for 
fried chicken as well as for Beattie's XXX flour, and he 
kinda hinted that a yallerlag ranch a mile down the pike 
looked like pushover prowlin'. 

In them days Joe Frazer, flash speeder of B Company, 
could do a hundred yards in ten flat, with Chet Croul hold- 



87 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

ing his german-silver stop-watch, but nobody ever pegged 
George Gillette as a cuckoo collins sprinter. Them two 
sojers made location on that hennery, penetrated the first 
line defenses of the Rhode Island reds, and they were just 
grabbin' some plump three-pound pullets when a shotgun 
exploded from the direction of the farmhouse, and a buck- 
shot barrage splattered all over that coonfruit cafeteria. 

Private Joe had practiced startin' with the pistol shot, 
and won first dash outa that hencoop, but before he covered 
twenty yards a pair of broomsticks in sojer's uniform 
streaked past him, and when Private Joe finished the mile 
run to camp he found Private George snorin' soundly in 
his tent, grippin' a bunch of rooster tailfeathers in his hand. 

At court-martial next mornin' it was brought out that 
Private George bolted the henhouse at nine-fifteen and 
reached camp at nine-ten, beatin' Father Time for the record 
by five minutes. At the banquet that evenin' the officers 
of the First Regiment, I, N. G., enjoyed spuds, greens, beans, 
and oratory, with Beattie's XXX flour as a side dish. 

Oh, boy! Them was the good old days! 




Hoglatin, Gibberish, Slanguage. 

In them times, sport, youngsters was right pert when 
talkin' hoglatin, so's folks couldn't get next to their dark 
secrets. Instead of a kid askin' his buddy, "Will you come 
with me?" he'd say "Wigery yougery cogery wigery me- 
gery?" in hoglatin — givin' each word a soft final and addin' 
the sound of "gery" for a bit of mysterious bolshevik flavor. 
After passin' fifth grade a kid could master gibberish — 
shiftin' the first letter of a word to the end of the word 
and addin' the sound "ay" to the letter, as, "lUway ouyay 
omecay ithway emay?" With them two foreign languages 
schoolboys could prattle in secret right in front of their 
dads. 

Now'days flappers and shifters gabble a new lingo, 
called slanguage, that gives our good old United States lady- 
food some awful scramblin'. Imagine, sport, an old-timer 
droppin' into a picher show to read movie ads and rest his 
dogs, and gettin' planted alongside a coupla world-weary 
little old wimmen — seventeen or eighteen years old — all fed 
up on dancin', love, clothes, vamps, and pichers, and dis- 
gusted with tiresome people, and particularly parents. The 
gabby bobbed blonde is givin' first release of the troubles 
of herself and a girl friend while shootin' the circuit the night 
before. She chatters fluent slanguage, and she may be either 
a laundry queen, a cigar packer, or a hi-sweetie. Her weary 
bobbed brune chum is a good earplayer, gettin' this first-run 
stuff: 

"We bloused into a nosebaggery with a flat-wheeler and 
a boiler factory, and they hit the dopesheet for the boston 
chow that a goofy greaseball served as we listened in on their 
feathers and clothesline scandal. A kippy pair of oilcans, 
I'll say! So we made the blow and gave 'em the air, and 
then crashed a jazz-garden where a flock of sub-chasers and 
dumb-doras were rattlin' their dogs. We lined up a brace 
of Goldstein strangle-holders, who were the cat's pajamas 
and bee's knees — if you went for there blaah. I went goofy 



89 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




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SCArv/JAL-'rVALKF.R 



TOMATO 



over one toppy wally, and while neckin' with him I ghmmed 
Percy foxin' it with his new tomato, and servin' the apple 
sauce. Some rugshaker for that bell-polisher, Sis! Woof! 

"Then I jazzed a whirl with a cake-eater on parole, 
but sluffed him for a fluky corn-shredder with a flat tire, who 
ditched his bozark to do my corn-crackin', my dog-kennels 
gettin' jammed somethin' fierce. Although half plastered 
and havin' a hipoil plant, he was no cuddle-cootie, for he 
handled his ice-tongs like I had T. B. Then we hooked 
a dumb-Otis and scandal-walker for the yellow dimbox, and 
I blouse to the homehouse to dingle-dangle this dewdropper 
until time to mattress. Ye gods! What a slow night! 
Nobody loves me! I hope it gets hot, so's I kin wear 
my furs." 

Now, on the dead level, sport — wouldn't that lingo 
get a guy's goat? Admittin' times is changin', and that a 
lota speedhounds is operatin' on last year's license, what 
chance has an old stager to wise up on an earful of this 
new slanguage? Say, boy — he'll never get to first base. 




SUB-CHA5E/? 



CA.KB-- EATER 



L'-£IL- POL/SHEA? 



90 



The Tale of the Scott County Apple. 




Come, little children, gather around the Old Timer, 
while he relates the sad tale of the Scott County Apple. 

Once upon a time, many years ago, a Scott County 
Apple grew weary of the simple life on the Wapsie bottoms, 
in the quiet onion orchard in which 
it had been born, and thereupon it 
resolved to seek its fortune amid the 
bright lights of gay Pretzel alley, far 
away. 

Its little brothers and sisters, pop- 
ping up their green heads to greet the 
glad sunshine, appeared contented in 
their pastoral environment, but our 
young hero had become inoculated 
with the unquenchable symptoms of 
unrest and the desire for a change. 
So, my dears, one beautiful evening in the balmy month 
of September, when the harvest moon was making eyes over 
the dew-kissed meadow and hibernian canaries were warb- 
ling sweetly in Chawbeef slough, this Scott County Apple 
cautiously pulled itself up from its mulchy bed, hastily packed 
its telescope, and took a swift run and jump into the brawny 
bosom of the ebullient Wapsie, where it landed with an 
ominous kersplash. 

And the next morning, while Old Sol was gently slip- 
ping his daylight stuff over the acquiline nose of the great 
State of Iowa, our young hero rode gingerly out upon the 
rippling waters of the majestic Mississippi, and it heaved 
a deep sigh as it thought of the little brothers and sisters 
it had left behind in their peaceful garden home on the banks 
of the Wapsie. 

Pausing in its journey to leak a few bitter tears, our 
hero observed an apple from up-stream — some Real Fruit — 
floating gracefully down the river toward it. 



91 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

"Good morning, Brother Apple," exclaimed our young 
hero cheerily, while slackening its pace and attempting to 
strike up an acquaintance with its chance fellow voyageur, 
"Whither are we drifting?" 

Now the Real Fruit, my dear children, being toppy 
and of some class, deigned no reply, but tossed its head 
grandiloquently in the autumn sunshine and sought a swifter 
current midstream in the erratic rapids. 

Undismayed at this palpable rebuke, the Scott County 

Apple hurried to catch its new-found friend, and, as the two 

travelers cut a dashing figure eight in a swirling eddy near 

the Duck creek delta, our young hero 

snuggled insinuatingly alongside the 

Real Fruit, exclaiming joyfully: 

"My! How us apples do float!" 
"Apples!" the Real Fruit retorted, 
with great disdain, drawing itself 
proudly together and casting a wither- 
ing glance at our hero. "Apples! Where do you get that 
apple stuff? Why, you're not an apple — you're an onion!" 

"Sure thing, I'm an apple," urged our hero, earnestly. 
"I'm a Scott County Apple. I was born and bred in old 
Scott county, on the banks of the Wapsie!" 

"Huh!" the Real Fruit rejoindered, with fine scorn, "they 
raise onions in Scott county — not apples! That's where the 
tall corn grows." 

"But I'm a regular Scott County Apple all right," urged 
our young hero, with a hot flash of native pride, "and I'm 
on my maiden voyage to Pretzel alley." 

"I wish you good luck on your journey," the Real Fruit 
grumpily replied. "I'm on my way to Missouri, and you'll 
have to show me." 

And at that moment, dear children, there was a great 
splashing and swishing in the water behind the two floating 
apples. Then a robust german carp, in search of its morn- 
ing's morning, espied the Real Fruit, and, with an appalling 
disregard of formality, gobbled that haughty wayfarer into 
its capacious maw, after which it sank tranquilly beneath 



92 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

the surface to hobnob with the menial Duck creek clam and 
yellow-bellied mudcat, the back-sliding crawfish, the blinkey- 
eyed turtle, and the slithering skipjack. 

"Which reminds me of a lesson I learned on mother's 
knee," mused the Scott County Apple : " 'Never get gay when 
you're full of sunshine.' Therefore, it behooves me to slip 
into the shallows and cut this sporting life on the gay deep." 

So, little boys and 

girls, our Scott County 

tep]T[Tp^jfJlj[^ Apple turned its nose 

shoreward on approach- 
ing the bustling burg of 
Bettendorf. And it also 
laughed immoderately as 
it recalled the great dis- 
comfiture of its haughty 
friend, the Real Fruit, and the ignominious squelching of that 
proud aristocrat. 

But, dear kiddies, the Old Timer wishes to remind you 
that there are many alluring pitfalls in this world to ensnare 
the unwary. Now, when this Scott County Apple approached 
shallow water, it observed a flat-bottomed scow manned by 
a Corkhill clamdigger, who for many moons had diligently 
scraped the murky Duck creek clambeds in quest of the 
elusive pearl of commerce. On, the approach of the Wapsie 
truant, the clammer, with an eurekan expletive and a joyous, 
"Welcome, little stranger!" seized our young hero uncere-. 
moniously by the suspenders and thrust it roughly into the 
pockets of his trousers. 

"Woe is me!" the Scott County Apple wailed. "To 
think that I sidestepped a jonah turn on a ravenous carp only 
to fall for the meal ticket for a hungry harp!" 

When the Corkhill clammer stepped from his scow that 
evening, to prepare his luncheon, he drew the Scott County 
Apple from his pocket, rubbed its rosy cheeks affectionately, 
and smacked his lips hungrily in anticipation of a royal feast, 
with our hero the complementary guest of honor, sliced in 
vinegar, as a sidecard to bacon, flapjacks, and spuds. 



93 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

But Fate, that uncertain mentor of our destinies, had 
decreed otherwise in the affairs of this Scott County Apple. 

At that particular moment, little boys and girls, a 
Hebrew peddler came driving down the river road, stroking 
his sorrel whiskers complacently and humming a plaintive 
yiddish lullaby. Upon being hailed in greeting by the Cork- 
hill clammer, the yahoodah replied "Oi-yoi!" — with added 
ghetto gayety perhaps, which reply, unfortunately, was mis- 
interpreted by the clammer as a reflection upon the valor and 
integrity of his ancestors from old Kil- 
larney — an affront which demanded im- 
mediate redress. 

Hastily drawing the Scott County 
Apple from his pocket, the Corkhill 
clammer hurled it with violent impetus 
at the itinerant commercial salesman, 
who, alert to the occasion, having sus- 
pecting ulterior designs on the part of 
the clammer, quickly poked out his fin 
and speared our young hero as it sailed swiftly and unerringly 
through the gathering twilight. 

Then, lashing his spavin into a quick trot, the Hebrew 
peddler drove homeward at full speed, to the bright lights 
of Pretzel alley, where he subsequently was greeted by his 
numerous family with many manifestations of affection as he 
displayed our blushing young hero, wreathed in smiles, in 
the palm of his good left hand. 

"At last I am in Pretzel Alley," sighed the Scott County 
Apple, while being sliced into the frying-pan with a ration of 
porkchops, "but I have a hunch that I shall soon see my 
finish." 

And thus it came to pass, dear children, that the Scott 
County Apple paid the penalty that Fate exacts of the verdant 
bohunk who falls for the glare and glimmer of the bright 
lights of the gay commonwealth or Pretzel alley. 

Moral : If the Irish or the Dutch don't get your nannie 
you have a fat chance with the Jews. 



94 




Enough is SufHsh. 

When you're putting on a party, 

If you use the stuff that cheers, 
Why the guzzling like a stew-bum 

'Til you're soused up to the ears? 
While admitting stimulation 

Will accentuate desire 
And pep-up the old afflatus. 

How about the next-day fire? 
For the law of compensation 

Takes its toll in ample score 
When the stew inhales too many 

Of the hooch the night before. 

If a little bit is plenty, 

Why — O, why — a whole lot more? 

If you have a shapely ankle 

And a buxom silk-hosed calf. 
With this first-aid to the snooper. 

Why that dizzy teehee laugh? 
If inclined to be clothes-simple 

And you freely blow your jack 
For the duds that flash the wishbone 

And the pimples on the back — 
When the roughneck upanddowner 

Looks you over, don't get sore. 
For the cutie eyeful peddler 

Has no license for a roar. 

If a little bit is plenty, 

Why — O, why a whole lot more? 




95 




The Carnival City Minstrels. 

Come on, sport ! Push the clock 
back a ripvanwinkle notch or two — 
to the days of Old Hoss Hoey and 
Ezra Kendall; back to the old days 
of Barlow, Wilson, Primrose, and 
West; back to the days of Billy 
Emerson's minstrels, Sam Lucas, 
and Billy Kersands; back to the 
days when Seth Crane and Fay 
Templeton sang the "Gobble" song 
in the "Mascot;" when Dan Home 
and Ferd Haymeyer pleased the 
folks at Burns's ball with their 
song-and-dance specialty, "Strol- 
ling Through the Park." 

Them was the good old days ! All wide open and every- 
thing, and none of these crepe-hangers on crabbin' duty. 

Let's see — that song warbled somethin' like this: 

While strollin' through the park one day. 

One lovely afternoon in May 

I was taken by surprise 

By a pair of roguish eyes (pause). 

And we met her by the fountain in the park. 

Some class to that, bo! Georgie Cohan nor Irv Berlin 
aint got nothin' on nobody in arrangin' them kind of words, 
has they? Then the dance — a sort of cubist non-com clog, 
with rollickin', raggy swing. O, boy! Now — second spasm: 

We immeday-ut-ly raised our hats. 

And fond-a-ly she replied. 

I never shall forget 

That lovely aftah-noon (pause). 

When we met her by the fountain in the park. 

Say! Did them guys get a hand? Listen, sport — you 
know what they're feedin' these movie birds, that does happy- 
endin' bunk in the pichers, in the applause line? Well, that'll 
kinda give you some idea of what they gave Dan and Hay in 
the old days, only it aint one-two-six. 



97 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Then, there was Billy Kelly. No dance was regular 
steppin' unless Billy trotted out after supper to do the 
"Sailor's Hornpipe" to the strains of Strasser's. At clog^, jig, 
or reel, Billy had it forty ways on all the soft-shoe artists at 
the local shindigs. 

Then, folks could always depend on Dan Leonard, Tom 
Ross, Steve Costello, Grunter O'Donnell, or some other classy 
hoofers to do "Fred Wilson's" clog or the "Silver Shower" 
jig after the musicians had packed aw^ay their supper. 

That's when Colonel Hipwell got his rep as leader of 
the band. Any percession that thought it was a percession, 
without the colonel leadin' the band, wasn't no percession. 
In them days M. J. Malloy introduced brick pavin' and 
bathtubs in Northwest Davenport — upsettin' all dope con- 
cernin' the Saturday evenin' plunge in the wash-basin, as folks 
thought is was dangerous to take a bath more'n once a week. 
Bob Porter held the ribbons on Lucy, 
the speediest little roan single-footer at that 
time, and he never took no guy's dust when 
a-comin' home from Schuetzen. 

You know the time, sport! When 
Ben Luetje hit the scales at a hundred and 
ten in his socks — before they got namin' 
alarm clocks after him — and when Jack 
Feeney and Jack Kivlin burned the track 
footracin' at the Mount Joy fair, doin' a hundred yards in ten 
flat, accordin' to Chet Croul's german-silver stop-watch. 

Yep! In them days you could slip on the feed-bag at 
Schuetzen park, and inhale a mess of sirloin, spring chick, 
roastin' ears, and vegetables, and polish off with dessert and 
coffee — all for two bits. And if any of them waiter birds ever 
was handed a tip they'd a-threw a hemorrhage. 

But, at that, a guy was lucky to draw down one bone per. 
Now'days these miracle monkey-wrench mechanics squawk 
unless they spear eight iron men for soldierin' eight hours. 
You see, it was this way: Back yonder, around eight- 
een-ninety, a lota Davenport young men got tryin' out their 
voices on barber-shop sevenths and doin' close harmony on 



99 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



the evenin' breeze out in the parks on moonlight nights. 
Others was musically inclined, and took their revenge out on 
different kinds of wind instruments. Still others was afflicted 
with declamatory delusions, rangin' from tragedy to comedy. 
Understand, sport, the motor cop hadn't arrived then, 
and the ordinances wasn't so sensitive and easy to fracture as 
now. Folks wasn't so particular as to noises, like the cut- 
out, the short-skirt, or the jazz trottery. 

The first release of the Carnival City Cullud Comedians 
was staged in the town hall of Dixon on Thanksgiving eve, 
in November, eighteen ninety-four. The excuse for pickin' 
on Dixon for the pop-off play has never been alibed, but the 
frost was on punk-uns all through the first part. 

But sumpin happened during the wind-up that made 
'em cut loose. The lightin' system consisted of one juicy 
kerosene drop-lamp, hangin' over the front of the stage. This 
glim was billed for a crab play, layin' down on the job durin' 
the grand finale. But Sojer Davis, the manager of props, 
proved up in the pinch. Grabbin' a rickety stepladder, he 
mounted it and quickly adjusted the lamp trouble, but as 
he leaned too heavy on one side, he took a tailspin down on 

the leader of the orchestra. 

The rubes thought that lofty 
tumble gag all in the play. 

It was the highsign for the 
fireworks, and they broke loose 
with applause, indicatin' that the 
hick is keen for athletic stuff. The 
other acts were greatly enjoyed, 
and then the hall was cleared, and 
everybody danced 'till mornin'. 

If good old Joe Miller had 
been at Dixon, he would have felt 
repaid for the labor on his original 
work. The chicken gag was used, 
and it went over with as much 
effect as in present-day vaudeville. 
Listen to this: 




100 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Mr. Fort — "How is you feelin' this evenin', Mistah Sam- 
sing?" 

Mr. Sampson — "Why, I'se feelin' ve'y salubrious this 
evenin', Mistah Fo't; ve'y salubrious." 

"Mistah Samsing, I desiah to plopound a culumdum fo' 
you heah this evenin', before this lahge intellumgent aujence." 

"Go 'long, man, you cain't compoimd no clumblum what 
I cain't edificate. 'Deed yo' cain't, niggah. No, suh!" 

"Ve'y well, Mistah Samsing, ve'y well. What I's gwine 
fo' to ask is, 'Why do a chicken cross de road?' " 

"'Why do a chicken cross de road?' Yah! Yah! Yah! 
Dat cuhtainly am too easy, Mistah Fo't — too easy." 

"Ve'y well, Mistah Samsing, ve'y well. Then tell these 
heah good people, right heah in Dixon, why dat chicken he 
done cross de road." 

"Dat chicken, Mistah Fo't, he done cross de road bekase 
he has a most impo'tant ingagement on de otheh side." 

The interlocutor — "Mr. James Lindley, the sweet-voiced 
Scott county nightingale, will now favor the audience with 
that beautiful ballad entitled, "Little Darling, Dream of Me." 

The artists in the first part: 

Interlocutor — Eugene A. Craft. 
Bones — Frank Wilson and Gus 
Brown. Tambos — James Sampson 
and Frank Fort. 

The songs and the singers 
were: "Oblige a Lady," Frank 
Wilson. "Little Darling, Dream 
of Me," James Lindley. "Do, 
Do, My Huckleberry Do," Charles 
Brown. "Little Darling, Good- 
bye." Martin Oakes. "Christopher 
Columbo," Gus Brown. "Silver 
Bells of Memory," William Dewey. 
"Annie Laurie," Eugene Craft. 
"Put on de Golden Shoes," James 
Sampson. 

The features of the second part : 
Charlie Brown, in refined song-and-dance. Frank Wilson, 




101 



THEM WAS THE UOOD OLD DAYS 



in a brief discourse on political events. Hugo Hill and Tony 
Biehl, the musical team. Gene Craft and Frank Fort in 
"The Merry Fakers." James Lindley and Martin Oakes in 
popular melodies. William Dewey and Gus Brown in 
"Wanted — An Actor," Lew Eckhardt, Frank Wilson, James 
Lindley and Martin Oakes, in old-time plantation melodies. 
The Lindello Mandolin club, Hugo Hill, Tom O'Brien, John 
Emendorfer, Lew Eckhardt, Tony Biehl, and Juie Purcell. 
Grand finale, "On the Bowery," featuring Lew Eckhardt as 
Samantha Johnsing, assisted by Gus Brown, Fred Hoelmer, 
Sojer Davis, Tom O'Brien, and the active chair-warmers. 

The show went big, and a return date was signed for 
openin' of the new opera house in the spring. Durant was 
the scene of the second performance of the Carnivals, in 
December, and the home folks stood the gaff at the Burtis 
in January. Blue Grass and Buffalo were nailed by the 
troupers in February. It was up to the good people of Le- 
Claire to throw a wrench into the works in February, as they 
framed a revival against the Carnivals, on a night when the 
thermometer hit twenty degrees below zero. The minstrel 
boys declared the affair a draw, claimin' a fifty-fifty split in 
the contest between blackface and salvation. 

Meantime, minstrelsy was get- 
tin' in its work, and a number of 
prominent citizens fell before its 
ravages. And among others, such 
artists as Maj Meyer, Henry Gar- 
stang. Bob Abbott, Bill Franklin, 
Bob Kulp, Charles Everheard, Bob 
Osborne, Harry Downer, Frank 
Hearne, Willy Mueller, and the 
Moline famous Big Four — Weber. 
Samuelson, Crimmins, and Bier- 
man. The Carnivals entertained 
in Moline in eighteen ninety-five. 
The final performances were 
given at Schuetzen park on July, 
fourth, afternoon and evenin'. In 



WHO'LL 
BUY ONE? 




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102 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



the mornin' a street parade was held with Strasser's full band, 
followed by thirty-six performers, vocalists, comedians, and 
chair-warmers. Then the company got wise and quit while 
the quittin' was good. 

The Carnival City organization was unique in home tal- 
ent minstrelsy — its members never resortin' to the sap and 
sandbag as stimulants to quicken reserved seat ticket sales. 
Many of our leadin' bankers, business and professional 
men owe their start in life to the Carnival City minstrels. 
Naturally Bert Dawson and Frank Yetter can't claim this 
brand of glory, because it was before they landed in the 
burg. But, you take Bill Heuer and Otto Hill^ for instance. 
Everything they have they owe to the Carnival City minstrels 
— and they'll tell you so, if you ast 'em. 

Bill Heuer was only a kid then, but he worked his way 
to Dixon and back by sellin' songbooks. Bill pulled a line of 
patter on the natives that made 'em loosen, openin' up some- 
thin' like this : "Ladies and gentlemen, 'Little Annie Rooney' 
was 'Strolling Through the Park One Day,' dressed in 'The 
Little Old Red Shawl My Mother Wore', and while 'She May 

Have Seen Better Days'," and so 
on, and by the time Bill announced 
one hundred popular songs for the 
small sum of ten cents, one dime, 
he had all the hardboiled gentry 
shellin' thin dimes like they was 
operatin' a corn sheller. 

Otto Hill was the professor 
and musical director of that outfit, 
and he could make that old pianner 
loop the loop. At Dixon he was 
assisted by Albert Petersen, Henry 
Sonntag, and Hugo Toll, and that 
quartette certainly did whang the 
daylights out of the "Orpheus" 
overture, and covered up all the 
weak spots of the show. 
You tell 'em, sport ! There's lotsa old timers in this burg 
that loves to hear them words: "Gentlemen — be seated!" 




103 




The Tank Town Troupers. 

^UT, just a minute, sport. This tale also has 
somethin' to do with another band of wan- 
derin' blackface minstrels that invaded the 
bucolic bailiwick of Solon — up yonder in 
Northern Iowa — about thirty years ago, by 
request, for one consecutive night. That 
was long before it became necessary for 
our leadin' citizens to study chemistry and 
learn the distiller's trade. 

Of course, nearly every male citizen 
over twenty years of age in any respectable community, at 
some time in his career, has felt the bite of the minstrel bug, 
and under the mellowin' influence of time he fancies he has 
been a regular performer. Davenport has growed a big crop 
of minstrel artists in the past forty years. 

On that occasion, Solon's population was closin' in on 
the four-figure mark and sproutin' city airs. One live wire 
of that burg, Seth Smith, allowed it was time to build an 
opry house, and, by jing, he went and done it. When it was 
finished and the benches set in place, it needed some scenery 
to give it a touch of realism. 

Charley Kindt, a sprightly young blade in his early 
twenties, was hooked by Seth for the scene paintin', and he 
put over a hangup job. After inspectin' the work, the man- 
ager was so well pleased that he released a hard-luck serial 
that touched a tender spot with the scene painter. 

Now, Solon, in the lingo of the perfesh, was a tank town, 
well off the main line, not covered by legit and rep shows. 
The manager wanted a live attraction for the grand openin' 
the next Saturday — a show with lotsa pep. 

Charley, right off the bat, told the Solonite that a first- 
class minstrel performance, with silver cornet band, and street 
parade at noon, was what Solon needed for an opener — a show 
that would go over with a bang and furnish the natives with 
talk food for years to come. 



105 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

The day bein' Wednesday, speed was needed to corral a 
troupe to invade Solon on time., but 
as Davenport was brimmin' over 
with blackface talent, Impresario 
Kindt knew where to uncover the 
best. The S. O. S. call went out, 
Joe Miller's joke book was dusted 
off, costumes gathered, performers 
drafted, wigs and burnt cork were 
requisitioned, and railroad passes 
secured on a slow freight. That 
outfit included some high-class 
performers, vocalists, and musicians 
who later hit the highspots. 

Lew Greeley Home did the old 
darkey stuff, and sang "Old Black 
Joe." Greeley was as good as 
Milt Barlow, and he had refused many offers to take the road. 
Greeley went so good that he hadta sing "I Love to Think of 
the Days When I Was Young" for an encore. 

Mel Trotter made his debut, with his sweet-soundin' 
tenor voice, singin' "The Little Old Red Shawl My Mother 
Wore," and, for encore, "The Prodigal Son," the song that 
Bill Nye wrote for Thomas Q. Seabrooke in "The Isle of 
Champagne," one verse runnin' sumpin like — 

Oh, the eldest son was a sonofagun, 

He was! He wasi 
He shuffled the cards and he played for mon, 

He did! He did! 
He wore a red necktie, a high-standin' collar, 
Went out with the boys, got full and did holler, 
Oh, he was a regular jimdandy loller — 

Sing tra-la-la-la-la-la-la! 

Tony Biehl as the Dutchman, Gus Wilson as the Swede, 
and Lee Grabbe as the Professor, put over a screamin' musi- 
cal act, usin' every instrument they could beg, borry, and 
steal from Dinny Hickey. 

Bill Korn made his first plunge in monolog, takin' for 
his text that good old gag of Joe Miller's about the guy with 
his slops on who ast Mike the copper, "What time is it?" 
"It just struck wan," says Mike, givin' the stew a whack on 



106 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




the bean. "I'm glad I wasn't here an hour 
ago," says the guy. Well, that went so 
good that Bill tried singin' "Tit Willow." 
Art McDonald dished up a stew of mul- 
ligan melo-drama from "The Moonshiner's 
Daughter," takin' the parts of both deacon 
and the hoss, as they stopped to talk with 
Mirandy near the lonely log cabin. "Whoa, 
Silas!" said the deacon, bringin' the hoss to 
a dead stop. "Is yer pa t'hum, Mirandy?" 
"Nope," answered Mirandy, "pa he's up on 
the mounting, moonshinin' ." "Wa-al," says 
the deacon, "I calklate as how I'd better be a-movin' to the 
mounting. Giddap, Silas!" Then Art switched from moon- 
shinin' to the gates ajar, and put over the chills and fever 
patter of old Uncle Tom at the knockoff of 
little Eva. 

Chris Schlegel was interlocutor in the 
first part, with Lew Home and Charlie Kindt 
rappin' the tambos, and Bill Korn and Tony 
Biehl shakin' the bones. 

The Alabama quartet, Schlegel, Trotter, 
Grabbe, and Home, did some near harmony, 
and Charlie Kindt got away with his stump 
speech, "The Politician from Scott County," 
tellin' about the Irishman and Scotchman 
that stood before a bar, and the harp didn't 
have any money, and how, after waitin' a 
spell, the nickel-nurser said, "Well, Pat, what are we going 
to have today — rain or snow?" 

Matt Lamb was property man, Fred Coates was care- 
taker of Tony Biehl's daaschund, "Patsey," and Billy Ritter 
was press agent and cashier. 

A heavy rainstorm tore loose on the evenin' of the big 
show, but the opry house was packed just the same. All the 
corn-shredders for miles around blowed in, bringin' kerosene 
lanterns with 'em, and they kept 'em lit in the gallery all durin' 
the performance. 




107 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



The company carried its own orchestra — an old-time 
square piano — borryed from Denny Hickey of the Hoyt piano 
company. On account of a five-dollar freight bill that piano 
was left at Solon, and mebbe it's still doin' business there. 
Because of the short time between bookin' and show-time, 
rehearsals was held in the little red caboose on the freight 
train, and the postin' service consisted of handin' out five 
hundred dodgers. 

When the troupe arrived, every sonofagun and his brother 
turned out to see the big street parade at noon, with silver 
cornet band, plug hats, linen dusters, and bamboo canes. 

Shortly before the performance it was discovered that the 

programs had not been printed, and as the printer had closed 

his shop and gone fishin", the office was broken into and Chris 

Schlegel set the type and Charlie Kindt run the programs on 

the hand press. The next momin' the 

printer flashed a bill of two bucks for 

material and use of type, and Fred 

Coates paid the bill a year later. 

As the minstrel company entered 
the caboose for the return trip. Matt 
Lamb lingered on the station platform 
and ast one of the natives: 

"Well, how'd you like the show?" 
"Guess we hadn't better talk about 
that," was the reply. 

Now'days it's different in puttin' 
on a minstrel show. Whenever the Elks, 
Eagles, Caseys, Moose. Masons, Owls, 
Camels, Turners, or any of them brother 
outfits, gets the blackface fever, they wire a canned minstrel 
promoter for costumes, scenery, makeup, and music. Then, 
after they lasso Tad Martin, they're all set. And. bein' all 
set, special committees leadpipe friends and foes for program 
ads and reserved seat tickets. Then the newspapers say the 
show was finer'n silk — that everybody is just dyin' to hear 
'em repeat the dose. 

Oilstock salesman ain't the only guys that spread that old 
mexican stuff, sport. 




108 




Street Music and Catarrh. 

E HAD bully music back in the old days 
sport, before the marimbo, xylophone, 
saxophone, and uke got jammin' up the 
works, and not countin' the ocarino, tin- 
whistle, or jewsharp, nor solo work with 
the triangle, tambourine, or bass drum. 
When the Swiss bell-ringers showed at 
the Metropolitan hall the standin' room 
sign was stuck up for the first time. 
Professor Martini had the folks all diz- 
zied with his sleight-of-hand tricks at the Metropolitan, too, 
and when he mesmerized the little gal dressed in a white 
suit, with boys' pants and ruffles at the knees, and put her 
to sleep up in the air, with her head restin' on her hand, 
balancin' on her elbow on a broomstick, he had the town 
gaspin' and wonderin'. Then Martin Greeley named a cock- 
tail in honor of Martini, with lotsa hop to it, and the folks 
with classy tasters and jaded appetites gave that Martini 
drink an awful play. 

Joe Emmett showed how easy it was to play "Home, 
Sweet Home" with variations on the toy harmonica at the 
Burtis, and the nigger-heaven kids cleaned out the stock of 
mouth-organs at Hoyt's and Wallace's music stores the 
next day. 

General Tom Thumb and Miss Minnie Warriner, the 
world's smallest midgets, were the big attractions then, and 
Miss Minnie held a public reception after every matinee, to 
meet the wimmen folks. 

The old bear man and his big brown bear came to town 
every sumnuer. The bear man usta sleep with his bear in a 
boxstall back of Deutsches Gasthaus on Second and Scott, 
He called the bear "Chack," and he controlled him with a 
clothesline fastened to a ring in his nose. When old bruin 
shimmied, the bear man sang a weird dago chanty: 



109 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Ta-ra, ra-ruum, ra-ruum, ra-ray! 
Ta-ra, ra-ruum, ra-ruum, ra-ray! 

The bear danced a clumsy sidestep, actin' like he was 
scared stiff. The bear man got lotsa pennies when passing 
the hat, and he usta say, "For-a fifta-cent 
I make-a Chack climb a tree," but they 
wasn't no spendthrifts shootin' four-bit 
pieces in them days. 

Nobody knew who started the boys 

playin' the accordeon, but if a guy strolled 

west of Harrison on hot summer evenin's 

he'd hear Frank Wickleman or some other 

barber pumpin' the "Lauterbach" waltz or 

"Fatherland" outa a beerharp. Or, he'd 

get an earful of a tinklin' zither, and know 

the Tyrolean warblers had been visitin' Turner hall or Claus 

Groth, and had started Al Fahmer, Billy Wagner, and a lota 

other boys raspin' the zit. 

There was more rivalry between musicians then than 
between soprano soloists in church choirs. If that aint spil- 
lin' a mouthful, sport, come up and get your money. The 
leadin' bass drum artists — Gus Wilson of Restorff's Military 
band and Billy Carney of the Light Guard band — were deadly 
rivals, and they fought a fierce duel one Saturday evenin' at 
Moore's hall before a packed house. Charlie Wesenberg was 
second for Gus, and Mike Ruefer acted for Billy, with Ernst 
Otto officiatin' as referee, 
and Mike Goetsch as bot- .-^^ 
tie-holder. The folks that 
think they aint no melody 
in bass drum solo work 
is due for wisin' up on 
their musical education. 

Nasty feelin' existed 
between them star drum- 
mers, and the Carney fac- 
tion preferred charges against Wilson, claimin' he manicured 
his finger nails and played guitar at weddin's. The Wilson 




110 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

bunch came back at Carney, sayin' that besides his bein' a 
moldcr at Donahue's foundry he sawed bull fid at Fire King 
dances. A big hullabaloo was bein' raised when the referee 
declared there was nothin' in union rules against usin' them 
kinda tools, and he ordered the drum soakers to get ready. 
Them boys went through five fast rounds, and the referee 
decided their combat work was fifty-fifty, and, while Wilson 
shaded the molder on animato con furia, Carney had the 
stockfish boy faded on prestissimo vivacissimo, but that the 
andante passages were considerably scherzante el torro. Gus 
said that sounded fair enough, as far as 
he was concerned, and Billy invited the 
party to the sulphur spring at Beattie's 
mill for a drag at the pump. 

Dago Joe with his harp was a sum- 
mer tourist. Joe was a real wiz with that 
hibernian instrument, and even if he didn't 
know a note from a receipt, he was king 
of the fakirs and could tear off either high- 
brow or popular stuff. How that fat wop 
could sprinkle the notes! Oh, boy! Didn't make a bita dif 
what key a stew party started to sing in, that harpist could 
pick 'em right off. Joe passed the hat after every tune, but 
he never passed passed a stein or a snit. 

Old time fiddlers done all the music tricks at dances, or 
mebbe some professor would play the piano with his hands, 
Now'days them dishpans is played with the hoofs, and a 
player that knows music is nine, ten — out! Any hunk with 
nut enough to change the needle on a talkin' machine can 
line up with the old masters now. 

Another famous music duel was fought between Soapy 
Smith with Barnum's calleyope and Fatty Saunders with 
Trinity chimes. It was circus day in August, and Barnum's 
big top was pitched in the old fair grounds out on Brady 
street. As the tail of the parade rounded the top of Brady 
street hill, Soapy took a crack at "Swanee River," and Fatty, 
on practice duty that mornin', answered with the "Sweet 
Bye and Bye." Soapy took up the challenge, and when his 



111 





THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

noise chariot was passin' the steeple he 
tore loose with "This House is Haunted," 
and Fatty came right back with the "Blue 
Bells of Scotland," takin' an awful wham 
at the high note on the bell tuned in q 
flat. That punch of Fatty's had so much 
zip on it that Soapy smelled scotch, and 
when he was passin' Pat Tuohy's joint he 
jumped off the calleyope and ast Pat to 
mix him a stiff snorter of scotch, sayin' 
that the bum note that Fatty pulled on the bells gave him 
the willies. Pat thought Soapy was easily nervoused, and ast 
him how he'd like to hear that note every day and twice 
on Sundays. Soapy said no guy hadta stand for that pun- 
ishment when he had such a beautiful chance to jump off the 
bridge. Then Soapy remarked that, as far as he was con- 
cerned, Fatty won the battle — that he'd never fight another 
duel with chimes that was tuned by a clam-digger. 

When the scotch bagpipers came to town in fair-time, 
dressed in kilts, you could tell by their knees they never took 
water for a chaser. The kids usta folly them kilties around 
when they played the saloons, and could tell they were playin' 
music, but couldn't get hep to the tunes, every wheeze sound- 
in' just the same. Them hielan' guys carried heavy campin' 
outfits on their backs, and miista had a hunch that prohibi- 
tion was comin', the way they practiced preparedness. 

Professor Guckert gave a mandolin and guitar concert 
at the Burtis, and the burg went daffy on that tinkly music, 
Jimmy Donahue bein' the first kid to tackle a mandolin. 
Lee Grabbe then organized the Venetian mandolin club, with 
mandolins, guitars, mandola, banjo, flute, violin, and 'cello, 
and he had Tony Biehl, Gus Wilson, Ike Freed, Frank Fick, 
Henny Reese, Charlie Ribby, Al Moetzel, Johnny Emendor- 
fer, Hugo Hill, Doodle Eckhardt, Tom O'Brien, and a lota 
other stars playin' for the high-class entertainments. When 
Lee talked of organizin' a saxophone quartet in them days, 
folks said if things kept gettin' worse they'd round that boy 
up for a bugs recital before the commissioners. 



112 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Of course, regular summer visitors 
included handorgan grinders with flea-cov- 
ered monkeys that would climb for pen- 
nies and salute when they were dropped 
in the cup. Then the handorgan grinder 
would smile and say, "Da gooda monk!" 
Later the hurdy-gurdy man came with the 
pipeorgan on wheels, and his wife and 
family did the hat-passin' act. 

Italian street bands made the rounds 
of this old town every summer, playin' violins, flute, and 
harp on afternoons and evenin's. Them birds had the artis- 
tic touch and plenty of pep, and they played the fids in an 
upright position, restin' 'em on their knees. Kids follyed 'em 
in droves, from Melchert's hotel to the Scott house and New- 
comb house, but didn't get close when they passed the hat. 
When them dagoes played in front of the Kimball house, 
if Doctor Connaughton had his big white fedora, white prince 
albert, and habits on, he'd stand on the balcony and toss 'em 
a silver dollar for every tune. 

Doc Con was a catarrh moses — nearly everybody havin' 
catarrh in them days from readin' the doc's monthly paper, 
The Medical Missionary. If Doc Con couldn't relieve your 
catarrh, he could certainly make an awful 
nick in your bank roll. Or, you could take 
a chance with Doc McAffee or Mrs. Doc 
Keck, and get a tumble for your catarrh 
and your coin, gettin' action two ways 
from the ace. All them catarrh flimmers 
wore bushy whiskers, exceptin' the Mrs. 
Doc, but her hubby sprouted a wilder 
bunch of wind whistlers than either Trade 
Smith or his brother Mark. Doc Con kept 
the microbes on the jump in his alfalfa by 
usin' a comb, even if that was buckin' the rules of the doctor's 
union. The only doc guy that had Doc Con on a barrel in 
the whiskers line was Doc Spinney, of Spinneyville sulphur 
springs, the place that's now called Linwood. Every time 




113 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Doc Con got a flash at Doc Spinney's whiskers he turned 
green, and then took a jump off the wagon. 

Them was the good old days, sport! No 
square-heads was tryin' to shoot constructive 
criticism, no oilcans sprinklin' sugar on sliced 
tomatoes, no dumbells tippin' bellhops to page 
'em at banquets, and you could get six beers 
for a quarter. But we had Slammy Ottersen 
hollerin' "She-car-r-go papers" on the post- 
office corner, plenty of plain soldierin' at the 
Arsenal, and Bert Brockett introducin' floor- 
walkin' and Harry McLaughlin 'tendin* the 
silk counter at Petersen's. Of course, the men 
folks was wearin' their vests buttoned and stiff 
collars and neckties durin' dogdays, just like 
they do in these bustlin' times. So was the wimmen folks 
against neck ventilation, but since then they inherited a 
coupla brains. Business men hang to the old collar and 
necktie, though, and no power on this green earth can tear 
'em away from the habits of the old paper-collar days. Ast 
any guy why he wears that junk around his neck on hot days 
and he'll say it's on account of his personal appearance. 
That punk alibi oughta get a hee-haw outa anything but a 
hard-headed business man. 





114 




An Album of Quaint Types. 

There's a lot of knockin' being done 
in this burg about that sheet of yourn 
and them pichers you been printin', 
sport. Of course, every guy thinks he 
kin handle his own work, but when it 
comes to stickin' in blinky-eyed Japs 
and them ambassadors to Bohunk, it 
looks like you newspaper guys needs a 
hot hunch. 

Why don't you print some pichers of the old timers and 
put new life in the old blanket? 

Now, s'posin' you'd print Steve Hoover's picher. Steve 
was the youngest boghead on the Rock Island road, and 
he usta pull the throttle on the old "Cannon Ball" when 
she'd roll into the Perry street depot at noons, back in the 
old days. Then Steve slipped out of his overalls, combed 
his whiskers, and went over to Charlie Haskin's livery barn 
for his sorrel pacin' mare, and showed speed for a coupla 
hours. Then he'd drop into Os Reynolds poker parlor and 
buy a stack of blues. 

Or, take Murt Burns, that used to swing the red lantern 
and sing the come-al-yez, at the old switch shanty on Fifth 
between Brady and Perry. There's as fine an old bird as 
ever pulled on a cob-pipe. Murt'd go better than a lot of 
the lame ducks that's causin' eye trouble. 

Or, how'd old John Shiner do? John was assistant 
bookkeeper for Con Mast at Smith's coal yard at Fifth and 
Harrison, and every time the lumber yard gang slipped a 
dime to Shiner he'd take the growler up to Struve's with- 
out a whimper. And he never laid a lip over the goods 
on the return trip. 

Why, sport, you got lotsa good material to work up. 
For instance: Take Dutch Pete, Ugly Perry, or Crum- 
my Jim, them old boys that drove sea-goin' hacks in the 



115 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

old days, when they wasn't no flivvers. All a guy needed 
was to get two-thirds pickled and drop into a bumpy hack 
for a ride over the jolty macadam, with Dutch, or Ugly, 
or Crummy, at the reins, gettin' a good churnin' all down 
the line, and nature would do the rest — just as nature does 
funny tricks to apple cider, elderberry wine, and home- 
brew now'days for Davenport's leadin' lady distillers. You 
kin imagine what them rocky hack rides would do to a 
guy now if he'd squirt some white mule into his radiator. 

Or, how about little old Hoopde-Doodle Dan Keeler 
from County Kilkenny? There was some worker. Started 
grindin' at four in the mornin's and was always done at nine 
in the evenin's. Laid down the first pavin' in Davenport, 
from Perry to Scott on Third street, thirty-five years ago, 
and built the Main street sewer in all that quicksand, when 
folks said he'd be ruined if it rained. Didn't rain for two 
months. After the job was finished it rained cats and dogs 
for forty days and forty nights. 

Every day after work, Hoopde-Doodle would shoulder 
a broom at quittin' time and march his gang in single file 
to Frahm's summerhouse and tap a coupla kegs. Got so's 
he could say, "Ein beer hobben, lunchman," in his choicest 
irish brogue, and he took lessons on Swiss warblin' from 
Henry Barmettler^ doin' this kinda work: 

Oh, the moon he climb 
Up the mountain high 

O, til-le ay-e-hoo! 

O, til-le — yi-e-hoo! 
Und he climb so high 
Till he touch the sky — 

O, til-le ay-e-hoo! 

O, ay-e-hoo! 

O, til-le ay-e til-le o-ee, 

Til-le-ay-e — hoo! 

O, til-le — ay-e-hoo! 

O, til-le — ay-e-hoo! 
O, til-le — ay-e til-le o-ee, 

Til-le — ay-e-hoo ! 
Til-le — ay-e til-le — o-ee — 

Ay-e — o-o-o-o-o ! 

Folks wanted Hoopde-Doodle brung up before the com- 
missioners because he bet everything he had, includin' his 




116 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

underpants, at ten-to-one, that Cleveland would nose out 
Blaine in the presidential election. Just a plain case of bugs, 
they said. Hadn't been a Democrat elected in twenty-four 
years. But when little Hoopde-Doodle cashed in for twenty- 
five thousand bucks, them wise birds crossed over and says 
that's a purty wise little mick. 

Or, how about old John Wunderlich, the night school 
hookey cop that usta chase the kids evenin's when they had 
night school in the old high school buildin' at Sixth and 
Main? John could do a hundred yards in ten flat, standin' 
start, whenever he chased a kid for playin' hookey, and 
he could see things around the corner with them ironbound 
specs of his. 

You reporter guys keep printin' stories about big men in 
this burg these days, but listen — you don't know what a real 
big man is. 

There's a whole lot of old timers the folks'd rather see in 
your paper than them foreign guys, kings, queens, and deuces 
that you been runnin'. 

Here's a bunch of likely old time lads that hain't never 
had their picher in your paper, and even if they didn't never 
sock much jack nor cut a fat hog nor nothin', they'd stack up 
better than some of them painful maps you been runnin': 

Chookie Kuphal, Chooner Burns, Cooktail Paulsen, Slot 
Reupke, Leaky Tuohy, Rooster Stapleton, Blinkey Murphy, 
Lately Carlin, Louse Mason, Limerick Hopkins, Stiffy 
Stewart, Skutch Lyons, Jack Cass, Big Jack and Little Jack, 
Dirty French, Joe Neibrisch, Dutch Steenver, Zip Hammerly, 
Tobe Gilmartin, Ski Peck, Jim Peters, Billy Hogenkamp, Jim 
Drumgoole, Chris Jipp, Cooney Krebs, Simon Koch, Chris 
Dittmar, Lew Pickens, Luke O'Melia, Butch Eggers, and 
Charlie Cable. 

Course, sport, you young folks is got it on the old times 
in some ways — mebbe ! 

Take heatin' street cars, for instance: On cold winter 
mornin's in the old days, Henry Schnittger heated his one-hoss 
bobtail car by throwin' a coupla armsful of fresh oats straw 
on the floor after Dan McGugin drove outa the Brady street 
bam at the south comer of Vander Veer park. A guy hadta 



117 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

keep trompin' his dogs right smart to keep 'em from freezin', 
and a coaloil glim done the lightin'. 

Amachoor cartoonists done funny pichers on the window 
frostin' when Henry stopped the bus to wait for some bird that 
whistled two blocks away. The hoss shook a dinky bell on 
his collar, and folks waited to hear the bell, and then hollered 
to Henry — it bein' an hour between trips. 

But when Doctor Allen strung trolley wires up Brady 
street. Captain Gabbert. Job Ross, Phil 
N^t^cl. John Rowe. George Marvin, John 
Temple, P. J. Hagerty. Sam Perry. Joshua 
Burr, Joe LeClaire. Sam Hurto, Jim 
Croak. John Haley, Andy Butler, and 
other wise hicks 'lowed they couldn't 
see how no hosscar would pull itself up 
Brady hill with a gosh-derned fishpole. 
Old Mike Wenzel operated the Third street line in the 
same etticicnt manner, includin' the hoof-heatin' system. 

Now you young folks is got electric light and heat and 
no waitin', and still you're bellyachin'. 

In them days wimnien that didn't have children had hired 
gals that done the work and washin' for two bucks a week, 
and them gals was tickled speechless with one night off, 
bein' Monday night — called "Biddy's night." Now the hired 
gals is called maids, and maids is lookin'-glass fighters, and 
knows more about Douglas and Mary than corned beef and 
cabbage. Maids sets a pace in doUin* up that keeps the 
missus steppin'. But maids never use punk perfume nor 
flash their teeth tryin' to look purty. 

Gals usta wear red flannins three sizes too large, fig- 
urin* on them shrinkin' when they was washed. Now'days 
they wear imion suits, but, just to show they aint muley, 
they play the game fifty-fifty by wearin' openshop waists 
and cloaks. They wore one-buckle overshoes then, with 
long woolen dresses to keep their legs warm. Now they 
wear golashes, and a whole flock of buckles tinkles jazz 
tunes and wigwags nosey parties the stop-look-listen signal. 
In them days a guy that took a bath any day except 
Saturday got hisself talked about. He took his plunge in a 



118 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

tin basin near the kitchen cookstove, with one side of him 
freezin' and the other side fryin'. Now he kin slosh around 
in the tub and manicure his toenails every evenin', but if 
he starts three-sheetin' about his cold bath, like some chronic 
headaches does, his friends kin only hope for a hurry call 
from the croaker guy. 

In them days cigar stores smelled of finecut and figleaf 
eatin' tobacco, or Havana smokes and scraps. Now a guy 
gets cracked on the beezer with a knockout punch of bean 
soup or Spanish stew when he slips in to buy the makin's. 

Wonderful was a descent, respectable word in the old 
days, and nobody was pickin' on it. Now every pinhead 
and his sister abuses poor old wonderful. Soup is wonderful. 
So is movies and mush, feet and fudge, gassers and gushers, 
bobbed hair and perfumery, and chow dished out at weiney 
roasts. 

But in slang they's been some improvement. In the 
old days when a young smarty began feedin' the old line 
to a likely trim, she'd say, "Ah, cheese it, cully — you're givin' 
me taffy!" When a bright boy with belted overcoat, tan 
shoes, and greased hair aims his best line at a peppy little 
flapper now, she hops to it with a cold fishy eye, and tells 
him to "Park that bull!" 

Yes, indeed, sport — things keep improvin'. 




119 




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At the Grumbler's Camp. 




Don't s'pose you reporters ever heard of the Grumblers 
camp down the river on Smith's island, near Linwood, in the 
old days. That roundup spot was opened by 
Boney Strathman and his brother Lew and 
was goin' full blast all the year 'round. They 
had a swell big shack, and there was always 
plenty of fishin' and shcotin'. In them days 
a guy could take his shootin'-iron and pot 
somethin' besides an english sparrow, and he 
could throw a line in the Mississippi and ketch somethin' bet- 
ter than german carp or the flu. 

Our greatest freshair sportsmen put in their spare time 
at the Grumblers camp, playin' stud, rummy, checkers, mum- 
bledypeg, and other wild and excitin' games. Frank Brady 
was the french chef, and Buck Kniphals the dishwasher, with 
Sawdust Billy and Duckfoot Malone doin chambermaid serv- 
ice. Nick Boy and George Halligan, in charge of the com- 
missary, kept the old fishbox 
loaded with bass, croppies, 
and channel cat, and the ice- 
box filled with top-sirloin, 
yallerlegs, and bacon. Prow- 
lin' henroosts and orchards 
was the popular moonlight 
sport at that camp. Gooshie 
Lagie was pilot on the "Po- 
tato Bug," the skiff that carried chow and pale export over 
from Max Hoffbauer's logcabin at Buffalo. 

Henry Jaeger, George Mengel, John Hentzleman, Soapy 
Matthes, George Havens, and Pete Otten, the board of direc- 
tors, had Jack Smith's steamboat, the "Island Queen," for 
pleasure cruisin' up and down the river when entertainin' 
their friends and enemies and candidates for election, or 
when trimmin' tinhorns that thought they knew how to 
play that little game called poker. 




121 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

On Saturday evenin's Tgnatz Schmidt would row down 
in his skow for the week-end, as that boy loved to soak 
the heel of the pumpernickel in beefsteak 
gravy for his Sunday dinner. He always 
brought his fid, and when Ig and Uncle 
Johnny Sauer sawed off their soulful duet, 
"Ach, du Lieber Augustin," why even the 
birds in the trees were charmed. Ignatz 
delivered the greatest political speeches 
of his career to his "distinguished fellow- 
citizens," and showed up them prohibition 
guys to a fareyewell, under the wiUows 
at the Grumblers camp, whenever his 
bearin's got properly lubricated. Many a Sunday evenin' 
Ignatz rowed back with a twenty-pound rock tied to the 
stern of his skow by George Herman, who figured that Ig 
needed exercise. 

Sunday entertainers included seasoned old troupers that 
had done big time on the glucose circuit. P. O. Kelly was 
topliner with his monolcg, about the airship "Dolly Doten," 
in his trip around the world and across the English channel. 
George McClelland warbled his sunshine baritone solo, "The 
Heart Bowed Down," and Tommy Atky sang "Stick to Your 
Mother." The Sawdust sextet, Herman Blunck, Buck Hoff- 
man, Sausage Malone, Pomp Flemming, Eddie Wulf, and 
Chris Timm rendered "Yes, We Will Gather at the River." 
Other high-class performers that done upstage stuff were 
Lew Rouch, Free Foch, Lounce Lerch, Frank Boyle, George 
Schmidt, Claus Kuehl, Steve Costello, Simon Yann, Doc 
Painter, Henry Proestler, Gus Reimers, Red Ehlers, Jack 
Frost, Jud Banker, Lew Meumann, Mick Lee, Dick Iben, 
Henry Jaeger, Bert Grosbeck, and Charley Palmer. 

But them good old days is gone, sport, and camplife 
along the old river aint nothin' but an imitation. Now'days 
they got screens on the shacks to keep the flies in in the 
daytime and the mosquitoes in in the nighttime, and old 
rounders aint got nothin' special to do but gabble hardluck 
stories and design phoney alibis for hittin' the mule. 



122 



Encore Music and Elks, 




Say, sport — Been goin' back too fur 
with the old-time stuff to suit you? Don't 
know nothin' about the old volunteer fire 
department, do you? Nor about the old 
Turner hall gang? Nor nothin' about the 
time the silver engine crossed the old bridge 
and came steamin' up to the station in front 
of the old Burtis house at Fifth and Iowa? 
Well, you missed a heap of big doin's. 
But come closer, sport — here's somethin' 
mebbe you kin wrap around yourself. 

Remember the time the Davenport Elks 
run wild and hogged everything at Saint Louis, coppin' all 
the big prizes at the Elks convention? 

That's when old two-nine-eight was young — when them 
antlered guys went down to Saint Louis, shed their togs, and 
paraded barefooted as naked Filipinos, dressed up in nothin' 
but burnt-cork, straw hats, and hula-hula skirts that reached 
half way to the knees. 

Never heard of Doctor McClurg, the leader of that perces- 
sion, and the world's greatest corn conductor and ingrowin' 
toenail trainer? Well, the Doc was a darb — a tall, fine-lookin' 
guy, sport, about a hundred and 'leven years ancient, bein' 
the oldest two-legged Elk in captivity. Old Doc carried the 
purple banner, with plughat, specs, linen duster, three-foot 
Santa Claus beard, dignity, and great credit to the lodge. 

Saint Louis reporters fell hard for Doc, and the papers 
was filled with echoes that blowed through his whiskers all 
durin' the convention, the Doc bein' seme gabber. 

Followin' Doc in the parade came Strasser's full band, 
thirty pieces, blowin' real encore music — and them birds 
could spiel even if the band was only half full. Then came 
them Davenport Elks, lookin' like they'd just broke out of a 
movie studio, and they burned up Saint Louis when they 



123 




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la 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 
pranced down Washington avenue, givin' their corn rah-rah: 

Davenport! Davenport! Two-nine-eight! 

We are from the Hawkeye state. 
Corn is King — so they say — 

We are Elks from I-o-way! 

None of them other visitin' Elks had a 
look-in when the judges came to handin' out 
prizes, as Davenport copped everything. 

In them days Saint Louis dished up 
high-grade six per cent brew, and, naturally, 
Strasser's full band was doin' the umta-ra-ra 
right in the pink, and they swung a knock- 
out the first crack out of the box. 

Only a few insiders knows how them 
tooters put it over, so it won't hurt nobody's 
feelin's to spill the beans now. 

Understand, sport, they was some high- 
class kidders trottin' along with two-ninety-eight then, and, 
bein' as they was out to take Saint Louis all the way to 
the cleaners, they had to fix things so's their full band would 
play only encore music — good easy-listenin' American stuff. 
Some job, sport — some big job — considerin'. 
Ever notice when topnotchers gets out to do their stuff 
how they show off and pull earache numbers? And folks 
applaud because they know them squareheads has just so 
m.;uch late-lamented melody to unlimber before they come 
through on second guess with encore music. That's what 
gives them artists the idea they're good, and they get tem- 
peramental and balky, and they hafta be petted and sugared, 
or they'll pout and take their little dolly and go home. 

Well, the Davenport Elks didn't want them musician- 
ers mussin' up their party by lettin' 'em murder Wagner, 
Neierbeer, Tschotahoochski, and other dead birds, so Dolph 
Henigbaum, Billy Harrison, Charlie Reed, Charlie Cameron, 
George Willis, and Dan Home framed with the two leadin' 
band guys, Ole Petersen and Heiney Sonntag, for some real 
lowdown dirty work that haint never been equaled in the 
movies. 



125 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




While the other twenty-eight members of Strasser's 
full band was seein' the sights four cellars underground at 
Lemp's brewery, singin' "Hilee-Hilo" and sayin' "Prosit," 
and gettin' theirselves keyed away up 
in G, tellin' how swell the Davenport 
turner society was, them two missin' 
links raided the music library of that 
full band and went south with all the 
classics, etudes, symphonies, and over- 
tures. They didn't leave nothin' for the 
full band to play but encores. 

You kin lay down a fat bet, sport, 

that they was helapopin' next mornin' 

while them twenty-eight artistic underground explorers was 

coolin' their hot coppers, and moanin' and lamentin' the 

losin' of their beloved earache classics. 

The tubby guy that blowed in the ringtailed tuba put out 
a squawk that was heard clear out to Kerry patch, and the 
cornist wanted to join the Kuklux and drop somebody off 
the Eads bridge. All them musicianers did the best they 
could to express their feelin's by usin' plain United States, 
but it couldn't make the grade. So they hadta switch to that 
more fluent heiney lingo that they knew how to handle. 

The judges in the band contest that day was all Elks, 
understand, and didn't know B fiat from straight up, but 
they knowed melody from nutnoise. And, bein' as Strasser's 
full band could only play encore stuff in the contest, while 
other crack bands from all over the United States tooted 
earache selections, naturally there wasn't nothin' to it. Dav- 
enport cleaned the plate. 

That was about the time that Uncle Sam took on the 
benevolent assimilation of the Filipinos, sport, and Daven- 
port organized Manila lodge, number four-eleven-forty-four, 
at Saint Louis, electin' Charlie Hagemann as exhausted roos- 
ter, chief of the tribe. Lee Grabbe took the part of Aguin- 
aldo, chief of the insurgents, and other Elks takin' part in 
that Filipino parade were Charlie Sommers, Doc Robeson, 
Lew Eckhardt, Dave Nabstedt, Elmer Smith, Charlie Korn, 



126 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Jack McCarthy, Henry Cleve, George Willis, Abe Rothschild, 
Charlie Reed, Otto Lahrmann, Ben Blinn, Tony Biehl, Lew 
Muhs, Charlie Kindt, Jack Lauer, Dolph Henigbaum, Jake 
Nabstedt, Charlie Cooper, Dan Regenitter, Doc McClurg, 
and J. F Nabstedt. 

When them two-nine-eight boys and Strasser's full band 
blowed back to Davenport they knowed the folks was proud 
of 'em, and after paradin' the town they went out to Schuet- 
zen park, where the city council met 'em and blew the lid 
off the park. 

Them was the good old days, sport! 

The breweries cornered every corner and always helped 
the coroner. They wasn't no wild mexs doin' plain and fancy 
carvin', no greek early-risin' pottin' contests, and coons was 
coons. Wide mollies with fruitjar ankles didn't wear lemon- 
colored hoisery and highwater skirts, barberin' was a regu- 
lar trade, and a cigarmaker could get a drink at any first- 
class joint if he kicked in with the price 




127 




a c 



CC „ 




The Exile of Johnny Robbins. 

ON'T s'pose you newspaper boys ever heard 
of Johnny Robbins and how he was ban- 
ished to Ireland in the old days, didya? 
Well, Johnny was a husky young laddybuck 
— "twinty-wan years of old, foive-fut tin, 
weighin' wan hunderd and sivinty-siven, and 
a roarin' Tip, whin I landed in Ameriky, 
beegob!" — and you've Johnny's own words 
for it. He was a harum-scarum with the 
colleens and the poteen over in County Tipperary, and when 
there was any skylarkin' at fairs and dances, Johnny was in the 
thick of it. He talked with a rich, melodious brogue, and 
believed in ghosts, fairies, banshees, and the likes o' that. 

The Robbins family was of the quality, d'ye moind, and, 
whin Johnny tuck the staimer to Quanestown, sure they were 
that well plaised they tolt him he'd be afther havin' his twinty 
pounds in goold sint him aich month whin he settled in 
Ameriky, 

So Johnny came to the garden-spot of the west, with his 
love for fun and his taste for poteen. Light-hearted, the 
young gorsoon made friends quickly at Brophy's boardin' 
house — after the news of the monthly remittance had been 
whispered at the supper table. 

Now, in Tipperary, Johnny had never heard of the bird 
known as the jack-roller. Neither did he have a suspicion 
that Johnny could sing like a thrush. Those things came as 
a surprise after the night of his first visit to Russell's scoop- 
ery, when he sang "The Boys of Kilkenny" to the boys of 
Bucktown in a comealye voice that rippled dolefully through 
his adenoids: 

O, the boys o' Kilkenny 

Were bowld Oirish blades, 
Whiniver they'd mate 

Anny pritty young maids, 
Sure, they'd kiss and cariss thim 

And tr'at thim so free 

O-ho! of all towns in Oireland 

Kilkenny for me. 



129 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

After Johnny crooned "Larry O'Gaff" and the "Shan Van 
Vocht," Mel Trotter and the boys told him he was a fine 
young bucko and that he could sing like a thrush — Johnny 
havin' visited the bank to cash his twenty-pound note that 
day. Johnny could sob as easily as he 
could sing, and late that night, as his 
thoughts wandered to the Old Sod, he 
grew melancholy and keened his grief and 
lamentation. 

"Wurra, wurra, mother dar-rlin'," he 
sobbed, as the big tears rolled down his 
cheeks, "could ye but see yer poor b'y 
Jahnny this avenin', with no wan to care 
for him, at all at all, sure it would break 
yer heart. Ochone! Ochone! Whin yer 
poor b'y came to Ameriky, acushla, sure he thought the goold 
growed on bushes. But the divil a bit of goold has he seen 
hide or hair of but the twinty-pound note from ould Oireland." 
Then his head drooped, and his deep snorin' gave signal 
that the roarin' Tip was all set for the jack-roller. Johnny 
awoke the next mornin' with nothin' but a bad taste in his 
mouth, but he was happy — for he knew he could sing like a 
thrush. 

Admittin', sport, that Johnny couldn't sing like a real 
thrush, he could certainly wail like a real banshee. He liked 
the jack-roller, too, for as quickly as he cashed his twenty- 
pound note each month he hurried to meet the boys, between 
times doin' pick-and-shovel duty to pay boardin' expenses. 
And he grew fond of ridin' in the hurry-wagon, takin' a whirl 
to the police station every few weeks for thrushin' or ban- 
sheein' in the open air. 

One day a few friends — Dan McFarland, Joe Hebert, 
Pete Jacobsen , Pat McCarthy, Paul Lagomarcino, Brick 
Munro, and Jimmie Mackay — held a secret session in the 
catacombs to find a way to sand the track for the roarin' Tip. 
Johnny had great respect for the power of a "joodge of the 
coort," and as he had sobbed so pathetically when he was 
pickled, they decided that Ireland was the place for that 
homesick boy. 



130 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Johnny took his farewell spin in the hurry-wagon a few 
days later, and the next mornin' was brought before Judge 
Bollinger at a special session of court. Witnesses were 
examined, the wild life he had led was reviewed, and the 
judge solemnly announced that it was the decision of the 
court that Johnny Robbins be banished from America, and 
sentenced to spend all the days of his life in the County of 
Tipperary, Ireland. 

Johnny appeared dazed. Then a happy smile lit up his 
features as he ferevently thanked the judge in his choicest 
brogue, and everyone knew he was the happiest man in court 
that day. 

In place of the twenty-pound note, the next month Johnny 
received through tickets for his passage to County Tipperary. 

Of course all the boys went to the station to wish Johnny 
good luck on his journey, and, as the train pulled away, he 
was standin' on the coach steps singin' "The Boys of Kil- 
kenny." 

And that's when Johnny Robbins sang like a thrush. 



//v 







131 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




132 



The Old Turner Hall Crowd. 

In the good old days, sport, old timers from over the 
Rhine would gather at the old Turner hall in the afternoons 
to greet young John Hill with a genial "Goondacht!" — order 
a cold stein of brew and a Modoc cigar, and qualify in a 
gabfest while waitin' for the four o'clock lunch to be served. 
After they got through moppin' up that lunch the tables 
looked like they'd been visited by the Kansas grasshoppers, 
and there wasn't enough food left to feed a canary. 

After supper they'd come droppin' in, one at a time, to 
play pinochle, skat, or sancho-pedro, keepin' tab on the game 
with a piece of chalk, on a cloth-bound slate that had a 
sponge tied to it with a red string, and they talked mighty 
loud considerin' the amount of money they was spendin' for 
the good time they was havin'. 

If them free lunch tables at old Turner hall could talk, 
sport, they'd have sootne awful funny stories to tell. Proba- 
bly you've read in story books about big banquets where 
"the tables groaned with choice viands." Well, them's the 
first tables that ever was known to groan, and they groaned 
plenty every day at four o'clock, when the lunch hounds 
lined up with their forks and started spearin' dill pickles and 
blind robins. 

Some fine days, when Traugott Richter and Karl Kuehl 
laid a foundation after makin' the lunch stations along the 
Second street route, they'd 
mosey into old Turner hall, 
all smilin' and happy, at 
about half-past three. That 
pair of chow-killers was as 
welcome to the old lunch 
gang as them cruel words of Sholly, the barkeep, around 
closin' time, "The beer is all!" Their chins would drop, and 
they'd look so downcast and gloomy you'd think they lost a 
nickle or sumpin. 




133 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




- H, •• " 



Old Turner Hall. 



134 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Traugott and Karl was awful conceited about their 
wonderful food-storage facilities, and the regulars knew that 
the liverwurst, pig's knuckles, schmierkase, and kieler-sprot- 
ten was just shakin in their boots 
whenever them star lunchers hit 
the trail. 

Some folks, sport, likes a cav- 
iar sandwich or lobster cocktail for 
an appetizer, but nothin' like that 
for Traugott and Karl. The fav- 
orite appetizer for them birds was 
a fat roast goose with all the trim- 
min's, and plenty of brew. Then 
they'd be all set and smilin', ready 
for the big eats, cleanin' the table 

d'hote from soup to nuts. They was awful sensitive about 
hurtin' the feelin's of any kinda food, and they wouldn't even 
offend a little turnip. 

Karl was Traugott's ambitious understudy, and an all- 
'round smilin', good natured sort of a guy. And, while he 
couldn't poke out four-base wallops in the food game like 
the old master, he batted over three hundred, and was the 
handiest clean-up hitter in the old freelunch league. Karl 
had more dignity than a crown prince in throwin' out his 
chest and twirlin' his fierce mustash, and when he put the 
bur-r-rs on that name of his'n — Kar-r-rl Kue-e ehl ! — say, 
boy! you'd think he was crankin' a ford. 

Henry Struck and Waldo Becker were great admirers 
of that pair of bimbos, the old gang sayin' that Henry and 
Waldo sported considerable tapeworms theirselfs. 

Now'days you hear some roundheads braggin' about 
how a coupla polandchina propositions around Eagles hall 
kin knock off a dozen hardboiled eggs, a loafa pumpernickel, 
and a coupla quarts of homebrew for afternoon lunch, on the 
way home to supper. 

Huh! That'd only make an old Turner hall rounder 
laugh, and he'd start right in to tellya about the good old 
days when Traugott and Karl usta drop a dozen hardboiled 



135 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Dutch Treat Days at Old Turner Hall. 
Ordering a "Dick Sinitli." 



136 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

plymouthrock eggs in their silos before breakfast, when they 
was feelin' kinda dumpy, instead of usin' Doctor P. Walter 
Connaughton's little pink liver pills — one dollar a box, or 
six boxes for five. 

On warm summer evenin's the old Turner hall gang 
would move chairs out on the sidewalk, light their long- 
stemmed meerschaums, and park their carpet slippers on 
the iron rail that the farmers usta tie their bosses to. Then 
they'd brag about the good old times they had over in the 
Fatherland, and they'd order their evenin' stein while they 
listened to the work of the maennerchor, liederkranz, and 
gesangverein rehearsin' upstairs in the dinin'-room for the 
big doin's of the Sylvester, harmonie, and turner maskenball 
that was to be pulled off the next winter. 

It was dutchtreat for all hands and the cook, sport. No 
callin' Sholly to set 'em up to the house and see what the 
boys in the backroom would have, nor no puttin' on parties. 
Each old stager dug up his leather sack, untied the shoe- 
string, and carefully and solemnly handed over his nickel. 
Nobody hurried. No chance for katzenjammer. They would 
just shake the stein around occasionally to freshen it up, 
and then sip slowly to make it last all evenin'. When ailin' 
or feelin' "not so goot," they ordered "a leedle schnaaps" 
from Sholly, and then hurried home to mamma, and hit 
the hay early. In the mornin' they crawled out feelin' fit 
as a fiddle. Some control, sport, but not much speed. 

The second generation put the indian sign on the dutch- 
treat, labeled the dicksmither a tightwad, and hot-coppers 
came into fashion. When young fellers got feelin' "not so 
goot," they ordered "a leedle schnaaps" from Sholly. They 
liked the kick that the schnaaps carried, and they took a few 
more jolts right in the same old spot, and then the singin' 
bug got busy. As old Turner hall doused the glims at ten 
o'clock, they then crossed the street to Fritz Quickenstedt's 
"Unter den Linden," or moseyed up to Herr Priester's "Die 
Kapelle" to show a little class with Swiss warblin'. That's 
how the mornin' after the night before was introduced west 
of Harrison street, over the Great Divide. Some speed, sport, 
but not much control. 



137 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




"Old Pete." 



Peter N. Jacobsen. 




"Young Pete.' 



138 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

John Hill managed old Turner hall, and Charley Kindt 
operated the theatre where German shows played on Sunday 
evenin's. The seats were carried out after the performance 
by George Matern, head usher, assisted by Pete Roddewig, 
Frank Maehr, Harry Steffen, Billy and Charley Korn, Frank 
and Ed Mueller, Reinhard Wagner, and Billy Schwentzer. 
The floor was sprinkled with sawdust, swept off clean, and 
the dancers stuck around 'til mornin', hittin' up the polka, 
schottische, waltz, rheinlander, galop, and redowa. 

Herman Warnken sold hotdogs in the hallway, and 
when he called "Heiss sind sie nouch!" Ossie Becker, Ed 
Kauffman, or some of the young kidders would say, "Gefres- 
sen werden sie doch!" Visitors from the left hand side of 
Harrison street thought "Heiss sind sie nouch" meant "five 
cents enough." 

Them was the good old days, sport! That's when Otto 
Klug, Bleik Peters, Nic Incze, Willum O. Schmidt, John Ber- 
wald, Otto Albrecht, Dick Heeschen, Billy Siemson, Ed 
Lischer, Theodor Hartz, Dick Schricker, Otto Riecke, Chink 
Pohlmann, Doctor Matthey, Theodore Kraebenhoeft, John 
Brockmann, Adolph Petersen, Henry Kuhrmeier, Pete Koch, 
Theodore Blunck, Henry Koehler, and other famous rounders 
camped in old Turner hall, and life was worth livin'. 

That's when Thiess Rawey, the mustardman, got control 
of the mustard industry, and he made the circuit with his 
leather apron and mustard bucket, dealin' out real mustard, 

Fritz Lieball, the scissors-grinder, usta make the rounds 
with his grindstone machine strapped to his back. He kept 
ringin' his bell along the streets, and when he got a job he 
worked the machine by footpower, the little boys and gals 
standin' around to watch the sparks fly. Fritz was so reg- 
ular in his habits that wimmen folks set their clocks by his 
visits, when the wind blowed so's they couldn't hear the 
waterworks whistle. 

In them times, sport, bockbeer day was a sorta national 
holiday around old Turner halL All the leadin' breweries 
posted flashy colored posters showin' a slmilin' billy-goat 
standin' on his hind legs, holdin' a foamy glass of brew in 



139 




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e 






CQ 

9 



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U 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

his front paws. Folks that celebrated bockbeer day didn't 
have any doubt about alcoholic content in that beverage on 
the mornin' after. Bockbeer looked just like 
;cs^^^ molasses, tasted like brew, but had lotsa TNT 
and white mule concealed about its person. 
When you came to, and opened your peepers 
the next mornin', that smilin' billy-goat was 
right there, and he cracked you between the 
eyes with a mallet that weighed a coupla tons, 
and said, "Now willya be good!" 

Terrence O'Brien, the flagman on west 
Fifth street, was short and squatty, and had 
a habit of talkin' to hisself, and the heiney 
kids from "Warren street school usta holler and tell him to 
shut up. "Indade an' I'll nat shut up," Ter- 
rence would reply, "an' divil the dootchman 
of me inches kin make me shut up!" 

George Ott was kingpin noisemeister 

of the old Turner hall crowd, and he presided -N , 

if-.' ^ 
at the "honorary card table," with the old ^-' 

Schmidt trio — E. Hugo Schmidt, Professor 
Niederschmidt, and Editor Dreckschmidt of 
the Staatz-Zeitung as his helpers. When that quartet got 
warmed up right, in a pinochle game, old George would get 
excited and whack the table an awful wallop, hollerin' 
"Schoeppe wie haus!" — meanin' "Spade high, as big as a 
house." One time when little red-headed Professor de Poli- 
tur, from Saint Louis, was polishin' the backbar, the old lion 
roared so loud, that the professor dropped off the ladder, 
spillin' a quart of his high-priced polish. It required the 
help of Emil Geisler, Henry Kohrs, Lipman Ochs, Rudolph 
Lange, and a coupla jolts of kuemmel to iron out the pro- 
fessor's trouble. The only time that George Ott failed to 
show up at the Turner hall was when he put in a week at 
the hospital havin' his knuckles repaired, aften an excitin' 
game of pinochle. 

Tailor Krambeck, besides bein' alderman of the First 
ward and an all-'round comical guy, walked with a limp, his 
right wheel sorta gooseteppin'. He was called "Ruthen Bur" 



141 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Traugott Richter. 




Nicholas Fejervary. 



142 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

by the old Turner hall gang, meanin' "the jack of diamonds." 
In them days the volunteer fire companies usta line up for 
the annual inspection down on the levee, dolled to a frazzle, 
before marchin' along in the big parade. After Ruthen Bur 
landed in the council he was made marshal of the day, to 
lead the band and city council down to the reviewin' stand, 
and that little heiney acespot felt mighty proud and started 
balloonin' right off the reel. 

On the mornin' of the parade Ruthen Bur visited Turner 
hall to take on a little courage for the big march, and he 
lingered longer with the old gang than was good for him. 
Them old rounders called Charlie Lippy to one side and 
done some whisperin'- When Ruthen Bur marched past old 
Turner hall that mornin', swingin' a baton and gooseteppin' 
like a major-general, Lippy's band was puttin' in its best 
licks playin' "Du Bist Verrueckt, Mein Kind." Then them 
old Turner hall rounders shouted and applauded, and the jack 
of diamonds was surprised at makin' such a big hit as the 
leader of the band, on the first time out. 

Away back in the seventies young emi- 
grants poured into this burg from the old 
country. They wore heavy clothes and 
plenty of 'em, even in summer time havin' 
their vests buttoned neckhigh, with heavy 
knitted scarfs, dutch caps, and wooden shoes. 
When they walked down the street carryin* 
their big bundles, the kids usta folly 'em and holler "Green- 
horn!" The emigrants would look kinda sheepish and 
frightened, and wonder what the kids was hollerin' about. 
One summer afternoon Hilda Schwartz, a buxom rosy- 
cheeked fraulein, from Schleswig-Holstein, stepped off the 
Rock Island train at the old Farnam street station, with a 
heavy shawl, a big bundle, and wearin' a pair of wooden 
shoes. Hilda's cousin, Heiney, a young farmer from Durant, 
was waitin' for her on the platform, and he happened to be 
chinnin' with Milt Howard, a cullud lad, who could deutsch 
sprechen in either a high-german or low-german key. Hilda 
hadn't never seen a real chocolate drop in her whole life, and 
when Milt greeted her in low-german, sayin' "Wie geiht di 



143 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

dat!" the poor little gal got all flustered, and blushed like a 
ripe cherry. Then she turned to her cousin and ast him if 
Milt came from Germany, and when Heiney told her that he 
did, she wanted to know what made him so black. 

Milt bein' quite a kidder in them days, talked to Hilda 
in low-german, sayin', "After you have lived in Davenport 
as long as I have you'll be just as black as I am." The 
poor little gal got awfully scared, and she wanted her cousin 
to send her back to Germany right away. 

The next day Hilda and Heiney took a freight train for 
Durant, where the little emigrant gal learned howta milk 
cows, weed onions, and plow corn. When they visited Dav- 
enport a few years later, to attend the bird-shootin' exercises 
of the turners on Mayday, they called on Milt, and Hilda had 
a good laugh when the cullud boy again greeted her, savin' 
"Wie geiht di dat!" 

The biggest event in the history of old Turner hall was 
the grand masquerade of the Turners, "General Grant's Trip 
Around the World." The Turner boys circused that show 
to the limit, and lotsa people thought that old "U. S." his- 
self was really comin' to town. Gustav Donald, havin' the 
build of the general, made up for the part, with the big black 
cigar in the corner of his mouth, and he was a knockout. 
The committees marched to the Rock Island station at eight 
o'clock to meet the "General Grant Special," to tender that 
old war-hoss the freedom of the city. The general was 
accompanied by Herr Foolscap, special reporter of the New 
York Times, personated by Heinrich Schober, an actor of 
the theatre stock company. They had all kindsa fireworks 
and redfire while paradin' the streets, and both halls were 
packed that night, the costumes bein' the finest ever seen in 
the burg. 

Among the popular pastimes of that period, sport, was 
beatin' the gate at old Turner hall. Young fellers worked 
at counterfeitin' ribbons and tickets for dances and masquer- 
ades. They would try to crowd the door between dances 
when the rush to the bar was on, crawl through upstairs 
windows, sneak through the theatre, or climb the highboard 
fence in the rear. Some workers, havin' a stock of colored 



144 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

cardboard and ribbons, would buy a ticket to get a return 
check, then cross the street to the wineroom at Otto Volk- 
land's, make up phoney tickets, and sell 'em for a quarter or 
half dollar. 

One cold winter night, when the Thalia society gave a 
big masquerade, a dozen ticket workers climbed the high- 
board fence in the rear, and were just about to pry open a 
window in the little hall when Charlie Kindt turned the fire- 
hose on 'em, givin' 'em an awful soakin'. They showed speed 
gettin' back over the fence, and they hadta linger a coupla 
hours around the big cannon heatin' stove in the Farmer's 
hotel 'til their clothes dried so's they could go home. 

Mebbe you young fellers think you got some big men 
steppin' around in the old town now'days, sport, but the 

old Turner hall gang had a man that 
was bigger than Fatty Raible, Carl 
Thode, and George Schick all rolled 
together. 

Never heard of Sholly Schwert- 
feger, didya? Well, Sholly gave the 
hayscales a wallop they haint forgot 
to this day. He was six-feet-four, up 
and down, across, around, and be- 
tween. When Sholly stepped out for 
a walk folks usta ast what was all the 
excitement and where was all the big 
crowd goin'. When he'd get measured for a suit it meant 
overtime at the woolen mills. Sholly was the slickest pen 
artist that ever lived in Davenport, and he could draw birds, 
lions, and fancy letters that looked like steel engravin's. He 
had a smile that reached from Renwick's pier to Cook's 
point, and when he moseyed around on cloudy days folks 
thought the sun had come out. 

There wasn't no wireless then, sport, but them Turner 
hall boys had a system all worked out that beat wireless 
forty ways when the Rogertown and Goosetown roughnecks 
tried to break in on their dancin' parties. When visitin' 
stews started rough stuff, some member of the committee 
would holler "Raus mit ihm!" and that message circulated 



145 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

quicker than wireless. There was a close-in football rush, 
and when the roughhouser pulled himself together in the 

middle of the street there 
wasn't nobody in sight, 
but after the birdies quit 
singin' and he dusted off 
his clothes, he could hear 
the orchestra playin' the 
strains of the good old 
Tyrolean waltz. 

If a guy hailed you in 
them days and slapped you 
on the back and called you 
"brother," you'd think he 
he was cuckoo or sumpin, 
and you'd hike up to the 
police station and report 
to Frank Kessler, or Henry 
Hass, or Charlie Faulkner, 
that there was a loose nut 
down the line that needed 
tightenin'. But when one 
nails you in these times 
you give the combination on your pants pocket a quick turn, 
and you wonder if you're up against a panhandler or only a 
lodge member with the grip and password that's pickin' off 
easy ones for practice. 

Times is surely changin', sport, and unless a guy drives 
slow and watches his step, he's liable to get bumped into. 





146 



Old Time Cullud Folks. 




We had some quaint cullud gents in the old 
days, sport — happy-go-lucky boys, who didn't 
worry so long as they got a chance occasionally 
to iron out the wrinkles with pohkchops and 
gravy, or yallerlegs and crushed spuds. 

General Houston set the pace as a flashy 
dresser, wearin' a prince-albert coat, plughat, 
jazbo vest, cane, and a forty-volt rock on his ingagement 
finger. By perfesh a corn-doctor, the general stopped all 
hoof trouble for the white folks, and had all the chocolate 
sweeties makin' goo-goos when he sailed down the line on 
a bunion expedition, with his instrument case under his arm. 
The Reverend Emanuel Franklin was tall, stately, and 
dignified. He preached salvation and sang in the choir on 
Sundays in the Afro-American Methodist church at Fourth 
and Gaines, slippin' the brethren the correct dope for trav- 
elin' the straight and narrow path. Reverend Emanuel never 
passed the collection plate, as he did chambermaid service 
on week-days in a Commercial alley livery stable, curryin' 
bosses, washin' buggies, oilin' harness, and other chores. 

Albert Nuckolls, with his quaint southern dialect and 
ready wit, was a popular favorite. The 
town bill-poster, he was known as "Prince 
Albert," because he always sported a gray 
p. a., trimmed with black braid, even when 
on duty with his brush and paste bucket. 
When the cullud boys leaned too heavy 
on old tom gin along Five-row, and mixed 
with the coppers, Prince Albert was the 
square-off guy and fixer with Chief Kess- 
ler. One day Adam Degraf got tangled 
in a stutterin' argument with a Pullman 
porter at Linsey Pitts's, and, in the excitement, showed the 
other cullud boys how to do flash carvin' with his favorite 




147 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

instrument. A wagonload of harness bulls backed up fifteen 
minutes later to ast Adam how come, but the Degraf boy 
had done gone and flew the coop. Chief Kessler met Prince 
Albert the next day and told him he wanted Adam, and 
ast when he would return. "Ah dunno jus' exactly how soon, 
Mistah Kessleh," Albert replied, "but it 'pears to me that if 
Adam shows as much speed comin' as he did goin', that boy's 
a long time ovehdue nov>r." That story of Prince Albert's 
has made the rounds in the papers regularly since then, and 
is used by vaudeville hams now when the hoochy-koochy 
gag fails to get over. 

John Hanover Warwick and his four sons — Locke, 
Gawge, Beb, and Idell — operated a barber shop on Third 
street near Perry, where business men dropped in to enjoy 
the quaint philosophy of the former slave. John Hanover's 
oldest boy, Locke, was not keen for the ra2or, bein' handier 
with the banjo, and one day he hopped an east-bound freight 
for Chicago. Locke returned a few years later, billed on 
the posters as star end-man of the famous Georgia minstrels. 
When he stepped along in the street parade all the cullud 
gals and boys lined the streets to greet Locke, and Pap War- 
wick was the proudest man in town. When Locke sang 
"These Bones Shall Rise Again," at the Burtis, the cullud 
folks nearly raised the roof. There wasn't a coon in nigger- 
heaven that evenin', sport — they were holdin' down reserved 
seats to show Locke they were strong for him. 

We had our George Washington in them times, too. 
George done whitewashin' and calciminin', and was the first 
cullud brother to marry a white gal. George lived out near 
Ninth and Harrison, and hung out his sign readin' : 
George Washington, General 

Whitewashing'. 

On Sunday afternoons he dolled up with plughat and 
linen duster, Mrs. George wearin' her big flowered hat, and 
when they paraded the streets they set a hot pace for cullud 
society. 

Charlie Gifford, with his big white hat and happy smile, 
was a familiar figure. Although Charlie never heard anything 
about "mammy" songs, he spilled a nasty tenor, could roll 



148 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



the bones, and call for little Jo, with Alonzo Twiggs, Mose 
Patton, Billy Messenger, or any of the young sports that 
inhaled bean soup at Mistah Hill's quick lunch counter. 

When Charlie Buck came to town with a minstrel show, 
he made a hit in the street parade jugglin' the drumsticks 
in the air while he played the snare druan. Charlie was so 
well pleased with his cullud admirers that he counted the 
ties back to this burg as soon as the show went broke. 

A splendid old landmark of the cullud fraternity was 
Milton Howard, who worked many years for Uncle Sam at 
the Arsenal and later retired on a pension. Uncle Milt was 
a gifted linguist, havin' mastered several languages, and with 
his stories from slavery days to the present time he could 
always interest a crowd. 

Henry McGaw lived on Fifth street, where the Rock 
Island station now stands. Henry introduced night janitor 
service for leadin' doctors and lawyers, and his two boys, 
Scott and Ed, were well known around town. 

Aleck Roberts was one of the best known boys in cullud 
circles, and in the old days when the Kimball house was the 
big spot around here, Aleck done the train ballyhoo act at 
the Rock Island station, and later at the big hotels. His 
foghorn voice w^as familiar to all commercial travelers. 

Then there was that happy trio — Jake Busey and his 
brothers, Tom and Jerry. Jake was educated by J. W. Stew- 
art, the attorney, bein' the first cullud boy to graduate in 
the public schools, and Jake was showered with flowers by 
his white admirers. Jake had a style of his own in jugglin' 
hard words that made the cullud folks 
gasp. Jake loved Tom and Jerry, both 
brotherly and liquid, and when the three 
boys met it was one grand reunion, and 
they felt so happy that they laughed all 
the time. The Busey boys were in great 
demand because of their pleasin' manners, 
and at every encampment of Company B, 
Jake was chief cook, with Tom and Jerry 
for assistants. Them boys had splendid 
voices, and although they had never heard 




149 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

"Memphis Blues," Doc Worley taught 'em to sing the popu- 
lar songs of the day. Couldn't make the Busey boys mad 
by callin' 'em coons. No, sah! They'd just laugh at you. 
They made a great hit singin' "Coon! Coon! Coon!" when 
out with the serenaders, the chorus runnin' like this : 

Coon! Coon! Coon! 
Ah wish ma coloh would fade. 

Coon! Coon! Coon! 
It's sich a dusky shade. 

Coon! Coon! Coon! 
Mohnin', night and noon — 
Ah wish Ah was a white chile 'stid of a 

Coon! Coon! Coon! 

At the finish Tom would roll the whites of his eyes at 
Jake, and rumble the low bass notes, Jerry would look solemn 
while carryin' the air, and Jake would soar up on a high 
falsetto note to the quivery finale. 

Squire Bums, of East Davenport, was another celebrated 
character. The squire spent forty years in slavery, and he 
could entertain with stories of plantation days and the cotton 
fields. With his gray hoss and rickety wagon, the squire 
did the light haulin' in the east end of town, and he was a 
great favorite with the youngsters and old timers whenever 
he drove down Mound street. 

Silas Hopkins, natural mimic and imitator, lived on 
Christy street in East Davenport. Silas was a gifted ventril- 
oquist, and with his bird and animal imitations could enter- 
tain folks by the hour. His sketch about the cullud parson 
visitin' a hen-roost, and his conversation with the feathered 
brothers, invitin' them to travel the true road to salvation, 
has never been equaled by a professional. 

Lotsa home folks has got the idea, sport, that hen-roost 
prowlin' is a specialized trade for cullud artists only. Not 
knockin' nobody's meal ticket, understand, but in the old 
days we had a white poultry frisker named Charlie Forrest 
who could vamp more broilers with his gunnysack, with less 
cacklin' and fussin', than any of his cullud rivals. His skill 
earned for him the title of "Chicken Charlie," and the right to 
have his name emblazoned in the temple of fame of our Scott 
county heroes. 



150 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Whenever a roost was prowled clean, not even a tail- 
feather bein' left, the fly-bobs knew that the grand old master 
was on the job, and after the bertillion expert examined 
Charlie's teeth the chicken charmer was rewarded with thirty 
days' board at Harvey Leonard's hotel. 

It was a gift with Charlie, comin' as natural to him as 
rasslin' to Farmer Bums, kidnappin' to Pat Crowe, scoutin' 
to Buffalo Bill, or as special talent comes to any of the grand 
old heroes of Scott county. 

Us old stagers may not stick around long enough to see 
it, sport, but in years to come Chicken Charlie will roll into 
his own, when some public-spirited guy will backfire his 
bundle and erect a monument in LeClaire park to commem- 
orate the wonderful achievements of our champ chicken 
charmer. 




151 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Taking a Jolt at Charlie Gallagher's. 

After a game of poker dice. 



152 



In Dampest Davenport. 




^LL, BOB — I don't s'pose you remember 
when the Davenport brewers went on strike 
because the bosses wanted to limit 'em to 
forty glasses of beer a day — during workin' 
hours? Crool — wasn't it? Ach! Gott in 
himmel ! 

Nor you don't remember the time of 
the funeral of President Garfield, when the 
saloonkeepers scouted all over this City 
Beautiful for keys to lock their doors for 
two hours durin' the services? Them 
joints hadn't never had a key turned in 'em 
after the day they were first opened. 

Course you don't remember — you was too young. 
Don't s'pose you ever even heard about Looie Schauder's 
goulash, either — on the mornin' after — nor of his hungarian 
noodle soup? 

Say — you missed considerable. 
More darn fun! 

Why, in them days, every soak and down-and-outer was 
good for an eyeopener on Christmas and New Year's mornin', 
regardless of creed, color, or nationality. 
"Say when!" was some slogan. 

But, listen, Bob — let's just think about the good old 
days of the frahmsize and the scoop, the tom-and- jerry and 
the free lunch. On Christmas and New Year's any gink 
could get a snootful and a big feed for two bits — easy. 

Charlie Gallagher always served tom-and-jerry to his 
friends on them good old holidays. So did Sam Stuckey, 
John Hill, Gus Becker, Martin Greeley, Henry Schroeder, 
and Bismarck Haase. 

You could get free lunch — turkey, goose, roast pig, 
oysters, and the swellest kind of eats — from Fred Roesch- 
mann, Ted Oelkers, Al Hartung, Bill Gray, Smokey Reese, 
Leo Schumacker, Lew Martens, Red Ehlers, Jack Frost, 



153 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




"Happy Days," and a lot of other heavy hitters in the old 
booze league. It was good home-cooked chov/, too. 

Drinkin' was more or less a fine art 
in them days. Now it's a wildman's 
game with the wild wimmen — puttin' on 
a party with the fliv and the jazz. And a 
lota guys is hittin' up hooch now that 
never thought of guzzlin' before, because 
they think the stuff's hard to get — and 
they want to show up this Volstead guy. 
Why, away back in the real old days, 
of Johnny McGuinness, Doc Mitchell, Joe 
Parrish, Sam Tanner, Philip Schlaap, 
Billy May, Johnny Smith, Pat Tuohy, Joe 
Cope, Fritz Quickenstedt, Honts Moore, and Ed Hood, any 
lame bird was treated like a human, and he could toast his 
shins up agin the old stove, and keep stickin' around 'til 
some lonesome party, lookin' for somebody to listen to his 
troubles, would blow in and ast him would he have somethin' 
to take. 

Talk about bein' sociable! It was always fair weather 
at the "Bucket of Blood," the "Double Elbow," "Zum Eck- 
stein," and the "Blue Goose." 

There wasn't none of them sneaky 
stickup guys moochin' around in the dark 
lookin' to sap a live one for the price of 
a hooch. None of this miserable gizzard- 
grindin' moonshine was bein' dished out 
in the homes neither. The wimmen folks 
was playin' the washboards and tendin' to 
their knittin', and not learnin' to be dis- 
tillers. 

Say — if every dame in this burg 
that's operatin' a home-hooch factory was 
sent up, they'd have to put sideboards on the big house out 
at Anamosa. That prattle about humans gettin' good with 
the blowoff of old John Barleycorn, was hoke for the marines. 
Folks didn't seem to get it, nohow. 




155 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Andy Glenn. 




'Happy Days. 




> Jimmy Dooley. 



]56 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

In the old days you could get a quart of real likker or 
a bottle of wine for one berry over at Roddewig's, Thode's, 
Haase's, or any of them wholesale joints. They wasn't no 
hipoil in them times, nor no doctor's short-pint perscriptions 
at six bucks a throw. 

Then, they had the family places, with grocery store in 
front and bar in the rear, so's the wimmen folks and farmers 
could come in and get their needin's. There was Pat Mc- 
Bride's, Fred Aschermann's, Bobby Garvey's, Bartemeier's, 
Shaughnessy's, Balluff's, Pillion's, Naven's, and Dooley's, and 
when a guy would settle his grocery bill he always had a 
sniffler comin', with a bag of stick candy for the young ones. 
Now it's cash and carry. 

Then there was McElroy's "Keystone," over on Twenty- 
seventh street in Rock Island, where the hard-boiled turks 
from Corkhill, Goosetown, Rogertown, Flatiron Square, and 
the Patch would wander on Sunday afternoons for the "big 
ponies" and the "crusaders" — all for five cents a crack. 

That was the original cash and carry. Bob. And it ain't 
tellin' no lie to say that many a swell package was carried 
back over the bridge along about sundown. 

Brick Munro, Perl Galvin, Clay Woodward, Nick New- 
comb, Jack McPartland, Jocky Manwarning, Heiney Mennen, 
William Pamperin, and Lee Beauchaine, assisted by Parson 
Ned Lee, looked after feedin' the Bucktown braves on Christ- 
mas and New Year's, and they always got the second helpin' 
without astin' no questions. 

John Russell, Lew Hannemann, Fred Abel, Jack Frost, 
John Schnaack, Nick Boy, Cal Witherspoon, Pat Marinan, 
Mike Goetsch, Henry Struve, Miles Brubaker, Ernst Wenzel, 
Pat Stapleton, Fred Wendt, John Masterson, Fred Billipps, 
Sig Goldstein, Fred Ruhl, Al Moetzel, Dinny Dawney, Pete 
Jacobsen, Orey Janssen, Joe Traeger, George Rohde, Andy 
Glenn, Fred Muttera, Henry Jaeger, Fred Vogt, Din Har- 
rigan, Henry Rosencranz, and young Dan Flynn, dished out 
the best in the house to all comers on Christmas and New 
Year's — and mebbe they'd slip you a pint to take home to the 
woman. 



157 




— d 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Why, when the big brewery guys, Henry Frahm, George 
Mengel, Oscar Koehler, CharHe and Ernst Zoller, and Bore 
Koester, made the rounds, they could set 'em up to the 
house for a five-case note. 

And now what do you get for a five-caser? You meet 
some slimey bootlegger in a dark doorway and slip him a 
five-spot for a pint of white mule that would make a rabbit 
spit at a lion. Then you take a shot in the arm and get 
goggle-eyed and fightin' mad. And then you have the willies 
and come near croakin', and while you're moanin' "Never 
again!" you're offa prohibition. 

Take these hopheads that are up against the snow, for 
instance. Why them birds, bein' mostly nuts, is so nervous 
they can't read, nor work, nor do nothin' to ease the bugs 
that is bitin' inside their noodles. That's where this strong- 
arm stuff comes in, and the flydicks knows it. When them 
there nobody-home guys gets illuminated 
with the snow, and hittin' on all six cyl- 
inders, they get feelin' generous and want 
to declare in on the other guy's stuff, just 
like reg'lar socialists. So they shove a 
cannon under the nose of the first poor 
blob they meet, or else stick up a one-man 
car motorman on some lonesome street. 
Whenever you get hep that a doctor's 
joint has been prowled for the hop. Bob, 
nail down your windows and get ready to 
stick up your hands on first call. 
Good old brew never acted that way. 
Course, it had some pep and action to it. It would 
make a guy feel like singin' "Sweet Rosey O'Grady" and 
"She May Have Seen Better Days," and help him to pull 
a few of them barbershop chords and do some close-harmony 
stuff, with his hoofs restin' on the old brass footrail. But 
no guy never wanted to climb a telegraph pole nor murder 
his poor old grandmother after takin' on a cargo. No, sir! 
After you got through singin' you was all peaceable and 
ready to hit the hay. 




159 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

And you didn't need no smilin' coacher to clap his hands 
and say, "Come on, fellers — get action on 'Smile — Smile — 
Smile,' and when you come to them words, 'Smile,' don't 
speak 'em, but just smile." 

Honest, it's awful to think of what 
one of them sissy birds would have comin' 
to him with the old gang lined up and 
primed. 

But you couldn't help singin' when 
you had real brew under your belt, and 
you imagined you was fine and dandy. 

Why, in them days, a guy had to go 
to a masquerade or play Second street on 
a windy day to get an eyeful. Now look 
at 'em! All the novelty has blooied. 

In them days, too, when a guy got canned at tli Ar- 
senal, or had his head chopped off at the City Hall for doin' 
too much work, he could open a saloon and invite his friends 
and relations to drop in and shake the dice and blow their 
jack in his joint, just to help him get rich. He'd say, "Come 
on, boys! Take sumpin on the house." 

He had a fifty-fifty setup for the big comeback if he'd 
lay off the booze. 

Now what happens? 

Why, when a guy hits the rocks and loses out on his 
job, the only stuff he thinks he can pull is 
to peddle insurance and real estate, or 
work the stock-sellin' graft, and he makes 
life miserable for all his friends and rela- 
tions, and his wife's friends and relations, 
in tryin' to blackjack 'em into fallin' for 
the bunk he is tryin' to put over. 

There's two old-time days in the year 
that everybody would like to see come 
back just once — them's Christmas and 
New Year's — with the good old tom-and-jerry, the eggnogg, 
the hotscotch, the rum punch, the bubbles, and all of them 
other swell drinks, and the big free lunch. 




160 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

But it ain't agoin' to happen, sport, because them good 
guys that don't hit the dipper nohow don't want to let any- 
body else take a crack at it. 

Looks like we'd been gyp'd. They took our little red 
wagon away from us, and they didn't even say "gimme." 
Just grabbed it, and then told us to be good. Some fine old 
army workers done a purty bit of highjackin' and flimmed 
us when we was snoozin' in the hammick. 

And see what they slipped us in exchange — jazz and 
hooch! Some trade, sport — some bunk trade. The hooch 
hound and the jazz jane! No more wimmen and wine! 

But they ain't no use puttin' up a squawk at this stage 
of the game. Them other guys was there with a cold deck, 
and they crossed us by dealin' from the bottom. 

Well, anyhow — nothin' like havin' a little plant of Old 
Crow on your hip for New Year's, bein' as they ain't no chance 
to unload one of them good old scoops. 

So — here's how! 




161 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Hotel Davenport Pie-Shaped Bar 

Cut to legal distance from church property, the city council changing name of 
Pretzel alley to Library street to provide street entrance. 



162 



Bobbing the Tail of Demon Rum. 




When the joy-killer whetted 
his skiv and hit the trail of Demon 
Rum in the old days, sport, he took 
him on the installment plan, lop- 
pin' off his tail by inches, to make 
the operation less painful. The 
old monster would be called on the 
carpet every so often, to stand for 
the goat degree, and ast to spot 
his tail on the choppin' block, to 
give the Neals, the Lungers, and 
other money-haters a whack at it, 
on a percentage basis. 

Of course, nobody ever heard 
an old rounder call for a slug of rum to wet his whistle, 
but the guys that's tryin' to popularize the stuff that flows 
under the bridge always speak about Demon Rum. 

When told to cut the wineroom and douse the glim at 
one o'clock in the momin'. Demon Rum threw an awful roar. 
He lost the tip of his tail. He bellered on twelve o'clock 
closin', too. Another link was whacked off. The order 
came to pull down the blinds at eleven o'clock. Demon Rum 
was gettin' desperate, and declared nothin' doin'. He tried 
to kid hisself by hirin' a flocka lawyers to back him up. 
He lost another rattler. Every time that tail showed signs 
of healin', the joy-killer swished the skiv, and Demon Rum 
hollered "Ouch!" 

One cold-blooded dry proposition, seein' that old Demon 
Rum was on the run, won out with an argument that two 
hundred life-savin' stations was too many for this burg. The 
cards was shuffled again, and fifty was invited to walk the 
plank every six months. That deal put the old monster on 
his good behavior. Good saloon guys began tippin' off 
other saloon guys not so good. 



163 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

The tail of Demon Rum was wigglin' kinda weak when 
the order was posted to blow the whistle at ten. The skiv 
dropped, and another button clicked off'n the choppin' block. 
Fifty good guys and true, with clerks and helpers, was 
dumped on the market for picket duty, coroner-jury serv- 
ice, or other light occupations. 

When nine o'clock closin' was posted, the tail of Demon 
Rum was bobbed clean as a pet bull purp's, and it had as 
much wiggle as the steerin'-gear of a salt mackerel. 

When the law barrin' saloons within a hundred yards of 
schools, churches, and public institutions was put over, it 
looked like curtains for three popular moisture resorts within 
the limit of the cullud church near Fourth and Gaines. But 
some wise-cracker showed the light to the intelligent board of 
deacons of the church. In order not to buck personal liberty, 
the cullud brethren gave the three popular moisture resorts a 
short lease on life by movin' the church up on the hill. 

Parson Ned Lee's mission, in the heart of Bucktown, 
dangled the skiv over a dozen booze-havens decoratin' that 
sporty section. The parson allowed he wasn't runnin' a 
church nohow, none of his clients bein' hooked up with that 
line of endeavor. But to play safe before knockoff-day came 
around, the mission was moved across the Great Divide to 
put a school off watch, and planted down near the park where 
it couldn't squirt embaimin' fluid into any pleasure palaces 
along the Bucktown right-of-way. 

The Hotel Davenport bar brought out a peppy argument. 
Some guys wanted the distance from the church property 
measured on an angle, to save the brass-rail for travelin' 
men. Other guys wanted the distance measured "as the 
crow flies." The "as-the-crow-flies" guys won. The bar 
was moved to the storeroom on the Pretzel alley side of the 
hotel, and everything was lovely — until some snooper started 
thumbin' the big law book. That great work had it doped 
that bars hadta have a street entrance, not spillin' nothin' 
about an alley entrance. The city council, pronto, called 
a special meetin', and Pretzel alley lost its good name, bein' 
changed to Library street, so's a guy could make the bar 
without duckin' up an alley. After the joy-killers, crabbers. 



164 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

surveyors, and postmortem workers got through with that 
barroom — straightenin' it out accordin' to law — it had the 
shape of a slice of custard pie. Then it was closed for keeps, 
and damp folks hadta squeeze into a green car and ride to 
Rock Island when they wanted a jingle. 

In the old days, sport, North Harrison street was called 
Little Coney Island, there bein' eighteen life-savin' stations 
dottin' that bustlin' thoroughfare, beginnin' at Lookout moun- 
tain on Sixth and runnin' out to the old Redlight. Henry 
Rosencranz was kingpin of that great white way, he bein' 
the friend of the hard-worker that sported the mansize thirst, 
and his scoops had wonderful drawin' power all over the hill 
district. 

When Rosey got the idea of developin' Little Coney, 
there was lotsa beavers in that territory, all kindsa whiskers 

bein' cultivated by his clients. 
One day Rosey met a young barber 
named Clem Proestler, and he ast 
Clem would he like to open a shave- 
shop on North Harrison. Rosey 
told Clem he had a small store- 
room that was just the place for a 
barber to absorb freeforall wisdom 
from tongue waggers, but Clem 
was leery that mebbe he couldn't 
knock off enough jack to kick in 
on rent-day. Rosey told Clem he 
needn't worry about that, sayin': 
"You pay me four dollars a month 
ven you got it, and noddink ven 
you ain't." Right there the first big real estate deal to open 
that great white way was closed, and North Harrison sports 
started gettin' their chins scraped twice a week instead of 
on Saturdays only. 

Frank Morgan rolled little brown sugar bowls at the 
Harrison street pottery on weekdays, and, havin' a notion 
he was some kidder, usta try that weakness out on Rosey, 
accusin' the old fox of bein' grouchy, and astin' why he didn't 
smile when a customer dropped in. 




165 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

"Ven somedime I see you not gome ar-r-roundt yet," 
Rosey replied, "I vill schmile all the time alretty." 

Old Tom Smiley thought Rosey's comeback so clever 
that he hawhawed and set 'em up to everybody, includin' Tom 
Glenn, the porter, and a moochin' smoke from over in Goose 
hollow. 

Rosey was proud of his summer-garden with its saw- 
dust-covered floor, where he served lunch and celebrated 
birthdays and holidays out under the colored jap-lanterns. 
Crowds gathered at these parties to listen to Rosey's speeches, 
they bein' gems of pigeon-english, always sparklin' and 
original. Rosey would urge customers with big growlers, 
that they wanted filled for a nickel, to visit Si Hall, Ed Jen- 
ney, John Conklin, Emil Beyer, Pete Foley, Julius Goetsch, 
Mike Heeney, McManus's, Bartemeier's, Aschermann's, Pil- 
lion's, Shaughnessy's, or other places that made a specialty of 
workin' for the brewery. 




166 



Hooking Suckers in Little Monte Carlo, 




NY TIME a guy wanted quick action for his 
coin in the old days, sport, he could get it 
good and plenty in this burg. There was 
a lota live gams roostin' along East Third 
street, ready to take suckers with poker, faro, 
roulette, craps, open-and-shut, the shells, or 
the old army game. The trim-shops played 
the game wide open, without curtains, and 
old western minin' camps in their palmiest 
days didn't have better tools for friskin' the 
boob with the roll who tried to outsmart the 
slicker at his own game. 

Speedy young bloods and foxy old- 
timers came from miles around to take a 
chance, havin' heard the bunk about Zeke Murdock makin' 
a big killin' at Smokey Reese's, or a pipedream about some 
pikin' stool-pigeon bustin' the bank at Lew Marten's. But 
it was always the old, old story — "the sucker loses and the 
gambler wins" — at every turn of the wheel. Clerks, factory 
workers, molders, mechanics, business men, travelin' men, 
guys with and without brains, would speed to the gam-shops 
to make a killin', and many a week's payroll was shot for a 
big win that never connected. 

Seasoned old racetrack workers, book- 
makers, railbirds, and touts flocked to our 
little Monte Carlo, to play bank between 
hoss-racin' seasons, just to pass the time 
away. 

The gams operatin' them joints was 
as swell a bunch as ever turned a trick — 
the easy-come, easy-go boys. They tog- 
ged in the latest, sported big sparklers, 
and when they couldn't get chicken they "Smokey" 

took the feathers, and stood the gaff like dead-game sports. 




167 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




They admitted they were business men, sport — specu- 
lators — and, while they were trimmin' marks and pushovers, 
they hadta stand for many a shakedown — from the regular 
rakeoff to the blowback to squealers that shot their coin on 

booze and told their wives 
they lost it in card-dumps. 
It was con for con — take or 
get took. 

Among the high-flyers 
of the old guard were Monte 
McCall, Hughie Corrigan, 
Kid Warner, Os Reynolds, 
Bob Clark, Sam Stuckey, 
Ike Gray, Billy Maddox, 
Bert Smith, Charlie Gordon, 
Mike Gowan, Walter Nolan, 
Bill Bryan, Cully Flannigan, 
Jack McLarkin, Tom Davis, 
Chub Finnegan, Ole Marsh, Frank Becker, Andy Billberg, 
Jakie Schaum, Fred Titus, Frank Scott, and other good- 
lookin' gents, besides a regiment of tin-horns, comeons, 
dealers, stools, steerers, lookouts, pork-and-beaners, and 
cheap pikers that did the cappin' to keep the old machine 
greased. 

The Chappie brothers worked the shells at the country 
fairs, and they were so clumsy that any 
rube could pick the shell that covered the 
little pea, unless he happened to put down 
a piece of longgreen on his guess. 

It took lotsa good coin to keep them 
there gamblin' joints movin', but the sucker 
market was choked with talent lookin' for 
ten-to-one shots — with the same easy 
pickin's it now has for oil-sharks and other 
grifters. 

There was all kindsa poker fiends 
runnin' loose, too, takin' a chance on blowin' their wages at 
the green table with the cute little slothole in the center, 




168 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

their hard-earned scads being slipped in to sweeten the kittie. 
The big gams kept close tab on them shoe-stringers, and 
when any of that small fry failed to report on payday night 
the houseman would hike out to see was they sick, or if they 
had a new jane on their staff, or sumpin. But generally they 
they could be depended on to come a-runnin' 
with the cush burnin' their pants pocket. 
Nice, clean work, boy — no shovin', no 
strong-armin', no second-story business. 

Besides havin' the wide-open gamblin', 
sport, this burg had the main store of the 
Mabray gang in the old days, and all the 
branch stores, from Hot Springs on the south, Denver on 
the west, and Saint Paul on the north, took orders from the 
big guy that operated from the main store. 'When a mark 
was tipped off for a goldbrick deal, for instance, the job was 
framed by the big guy with the brains in the main store, the 
workers all bein' hand-picked specialists in their line. Any 
kinda work, from the badger game to green-goods, wire- 
tappin', foot-racin', hoss-racin', or rasslin', was doped out in 
the main store, and an intensive campaign planned, just the 
same as big drives is put across now'days. 

The tightwad, lookin' for a sure-shot, was the favorite 
fruit of the Mabray outfit, and many a close-fisted hick from 
the corn-belt was spotted for cappers of the gang by his best 
friend in the home town — hunchin' 'em on his weakness and 
how to spear him in the vital spot. The workers in the main 
store always came clean on cuttin' the coin, though, and the 
brother-in-law, banker, clergyman, or the bosom friend that 
tipped the deal always got in on an even split with the 
trimmers that done the real work. By lettin' a greedy tight 
win a coupla hundred smackers the first time out, it was easy 
to take him for his big bundle later. 

Some fine hoss-racin' and foot-racin' jobs were pulled off 
at the old Mile Track, too, demonstratin' to the surethingers 
from other parts of the country that the sucker and his coin 
are soon separated. 

When Jack Cavanaugh saw how simple it was to frame 
a surething to win fifty thousand bucks, trimmin' a mike on a 



169 



in REAL ilOHElr ' 
DON'T BELIEVE IT 
JOST FEEL THIS' 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

fake rasslin' job, the workers took Jack down to Missouri or 
Arkansas for action. He bein' kinda particular, they let him 
have his own way in everything, even to nainin' the stake- 
holder and referee, and to show him that real coin was put 
up they let him feel the bundle. That feel made his mouth 
water, and he swollyed the bait — hook, line, and sinker. 

It took six months of careful work to 
frame that case. Then, when the fake 
sheriff arrested the gang — after the fake 
rassler faked a busted blood-vessel and a 
hemorrhage, by bitin' a bladder of red 
ink — Jack made his quick getaway with 
the other trimmers, so's he wouldn't get 
pinched for bein' in on the murder of the 
rassler. And when he couldn't find his 
own stakeholder, to blow back the big 
bundle of coin he had coughed up, Jack 
tumbled that he'd been crossed. Then he squawked. It 
took lotsa time to round up them grifters, but Jack kept after 
'em 'til he broke up the gang. 

Birds that get primed for big winnin's take long chances, 
and they hate a five-cent piece like Farmer Burns or Tom 
Sharkey. 





170 



Along the Bucktown Rialto. 




We had some corkin' variety theatres and 
dance halls in Bucktown in the old days, 
too — Jack McPartland's "Bijou," Perl Gal- 
M^^W^JI vin's "Standard," Oscar Raphael's "Or- 
pheum," Brick Munro's "Pavilion," and 
Jocky Manwarning's "Dance Hall." Them 
einterprisin' amusement places catered 
especially to the needs of restless rounders 
lookin' for speedy entertainment. They 
toplined the cheesy slapstickers and raspy- 
voiced crowbaits that could take a rise outa soused rubes. 
Operatin' on the all-night schedule and glucose circuit, things 
didn't hit the right stride till the clock in the steeple struck 
a dozen or so. Brick Munro originated the cabaret at his 
"Pavilion," and it spread over the country like wildfire. 

Understand, sport, that was back in the time of the 
World's Fair at Chicago, when Fatima, Little Egypt, and 
other greasy-lookin' egyptian dames on the Midway slipped 
into their bead dresses and veils and done the "hoochie- 
koochie," a new-style dance that didn't wear out much shoe 
leather nor need a waxed floor. Snakey- 
eyed arabs with black whiskers and yaller 
teeth made squawky music with wheezy 
clarinets and honky-tonky tomtoms, 
helpin' the dancers with that weird oriental 
twitchin'. 

A complete change in dancin' styles 
was noticed in this country shortly after, 
that wiggledy harem movement makin* 
quite a hit. Then the good old quadrille, 
Virginia reel, twostep, polka, schottische, 
and other dances havin' hoof action, seemed too tame, the 
young folks sourin' on that stone-age stuff. So the old time 
dances got the hook. 




171 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

In the old days they used one caller for the square 
dances. Now'days they got a lota bawlers, watchin' to see 
that pivoters dance the round dance on the square. 

Jocky Manwarning bein' a hustlin' young guy in them 
times, wanted to operate his dump on uptodate lines, so he 
introduced the "cuban grind," a dance imported by sojers 
that done service in tenderloin districts down in Porto Rico. 
Later Jock put on the "grizzly bear," a dance that made a 
big hit with sailors right off the whalers along the Barbary 
coast in 'Frisco. People flocked to Jock's place to have a look. 
Slummin' parties got fashionable, and they usta visit Jock's 
to glom the new dances — sometimes takin' a whirl at 'em, 
just for the fun of the thing. 

When the orchestra played the "Streets of Cairo," the 
popular selection at that time, the dancers would sing: 

She never saw^ the streets of Cairo, 

On the Midway she had never strayed, 

She never savyr the hoochie-koochie. 
Poor little country maid. 

That was durin' the ragtime musical period, sport, when 
coon songs was all the rage, and white boys and gals usta 

sing "All Coons Look Alike 
to Me," "All I Want is My 
Black Baby Back," "I Want 
a Real Coon," "Mistah 
Johnsing, Turn Me Loose," 
and "My Coal Black Lady." 
The "Cakewalk" was at the 
height of its glory, "Little 
Annie Rooney" was hittin' 
the skids, and "Yoo-hoo" 
wasn't even dreamed of. Cal- 
isthenics and the contortions 
kinda got tangled with foot- 
work, the tango, bunny-hug, 
and foxtrot comin' to the 
front later, with the gasbus and moanin' saxophone. 

When Jocky Manwarning came to town from his farm 
over near Coal Valley last winter, to up-and-down the old 




172 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

spots, he dropped into a dance hall to see the slashers and 
shim,my-shakers in action. Jocky rubbed his eyes like Rip 
Vanwinkle, took one good look, turned a deep scarlet, and 
made a rush for the door. The doorman called to his and ast : 

'"Why the speed, Jock? Where to?" 

"Back to the farm for me, bo," said Jock, pointin' to a 
young couple steppin' the telephone dance. "They're workin' 
children on my old stuff — with coon music ! I'm done ! I'm 
t'rough!" 

Them was the good old days, sport. No free-lance med- 
dlers out picketin' the joy-joints, and you could take the game 
as it laid, or leave it alone, and no questions ast. 

Dinny Dawny wouldn't allow rag-chewin' in his refresh- 
ment parlor. If a coupla windy guys got argufyin' too strong, 
Dinny would say, "Hold on there! If you boys wanta fight 
join the army or get married. This ain't no prize ring" One 
day a fortune-teller wanted to run a tab, and Dinny told him 
he was a bum fortune-teller, or he'd know better than to ast 
such foolish questions. 




173 




B 
U 



a, 

B 
(9 

O 

u 



ti 



-t-> r 












Skunk River Amenities. 




When Packey McFar- 
land and Kid Herman was 
matched for the big go at 
the old CoHseuim, to decide 
who was to take on Battlin' 
Nelson for the lightweight 
championship, some gum- 
shoe snoopers got to the 
governor out at Des Moines, 
stagin' the big knock, just 
when things was all set. 
They had the nerve to tell him that our little party was to 
be a prize fight instead of a boxin' mjatch! Kinya beat it? 

At that time the gov happened to be grandstandin' for 
the high-grass vote of the local grangers lodge out in Ap- 
panoose county, so he wired the sheriff of good old Scott 
county, astin' him to block the big mill. Then, thinkin' the 
wires, or sumpin, might get crossed, the gov ordered the 
militia company to the ringside, to be sure of makin' a record 
for hisself for the comin' election. 

It was a grand sight that moonlight evenin', sport, to 
see them dashin' young sojer boys of Company B marchin' 
four abreast, with loaded rifles, down the street to the Coli- 
seum, that old shack bein' packed to the rafters with sports 
and fight fans from all over the west. 

Nobody ever heard of the folks in the Capital of the 
good old State of Scott County interferin' with the folks that 
live out where the tall corn grows, or astin' them to pipe 
down on their sportin' stuff. Not much! So, after the old 
Col was filled, the doors was locked from the inside, so's they 
wouldn't be no interruptin' of the services, and then Young 
McGovern and Pete Giese opened the show with a prize 
waltz of six stanzas, follyed by Biz Mackay and Ad Wolgast 
in a ten-round pettin' party. Then Malachy Hogan called 



175 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Packey and the Kid to the center of the ring^ and, seein' that 
their hands was nicely manicured, he told 'em to be careful 
and not slap too hard, and to play for the wrists. Then the 
gong sounded, and everything, just like at a regular fight, 
and them two blood-thirsty maulers done 
their celebrated soft-shoe sketch. 

The sojer boys filled all the choice 
front-row ringside seats, and they had the 
time of their young lives kiddin' the would- 
be champeens on their onion stuff. 

Captain Oliver W. Kulp was called 
out to Des Moines by the gov a few days 
later, to slip him the how-come on the 
hokum of the night of the big scrap. The 
cap told the gov that it was a nice friendly 
exercise in wrist-slappin' between friends, to get the money, 
and any porkhead that saw anything resemblin' prize fightin' 
that evenin' had him cheated for optical range, low visibility, 
illusion, and all-'round imagination. 

The gallant young cap had his picher printed in all the 
leadin' newspapers of the country the next mornin', right 
alongside the gov's. Lotsa nosey people thought them two 
boys was playin' the spotlight in a beauty contest, and, as 
Ollie had it all over the gov when it come right down to 
classy mug stuff, he was voted the best-lookin' sojer guy in 
the Hawkeye state. 

That wasn't the first time, sport, that them there Des 
Moinesers got a set-back for buttin' in on our private parties. 
Why, away back in the real old days, when Ernst Claussen 
was fillin' the mayor's chair to capacity, them pleasure elimi- 
nators got worryin' and losin' sleep because we had eight 
per cent brew, summer gardens, dances, and everything. So 
this governor party takes his pen in hand and tries to give 
our mayor a nice friendly jackin'-up, tellin' him to tune 
down the sportin' lay in this burg, tell the folks to douse the 
candle at nine, take an early hop in the hay, and make a stall 
at bein' good, be it ever so painful. 

That evenin' there happened to be a meetin' of the city 
council at the old city hall buildin', on Brady street, between 



176 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Fifth and Sixth, and the mayor swung a haymaker on the 
gov, givin' him the jump-off number right there. 

You bet! When the mayor got warmed up to his work 
that night he whacked the desk with his left mit, and hollered 
loud enough to be heard away out to the Skunk river. He 
told the gov and all his pals and old cronies about how us 
folks had built the church on the hilltop, the little red school- 
house in the valley, and the saloon right in between. He 
said he wasn't knockin' on them' highbrow guys that had the 
goods in their cellars, but he came out strong for the workin' 
m,an's club-room with its sawdust-covered floor, where a 
tired old rounder could lap up a scoopa suds after a hard 
day's grind, and forget his troubles the same as the rich guy. 
Then the city council came out flat-footed for the Free 
and Independent State of Scott county, 
and all them foreign governments was 
warned to quit snoopin' around and startin' 
trouble or they'd get their nose pulled. 

Everybody admitted that the gov had 
a fine set of works in that noodle of his'n, 
never havin' a comeback for the ballin' he 
got from Mayor Claussen. 

Folks that's fond of riddles has lotsa 
fun now'days, wonderin' if them sporty old 
times is due for a return engagement. Fig- 
ger it out yourself, sport, with your pencil. How long did 
it take them never-tirin' dry workers to land the knockout, 
playin' a lone hand. Now they got the boot-leggers, high- 
jackers, and shake-downers on their staff. That's easy 
figgerin' — unless them birds of a feather has a fallin' out, or 
their business agents tell 'em to pull a strike. Any dum- 
bell kin write that answer. 

Moonshinin' makes strange bedfellers, sport. 








177 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



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1 



Davenport's First Human Fly, 

Jocko Kane, 
And his pals — Tho McNamara and Cal Gillooley. 



178 



The Human Fly at the Burtis. 



VEN if the guy that designed the 
Burtis opera house didn't know it, 
sport, he made easy pickin's for the 
first human fly. On each side of 
the entrance, from the ground to 
the roof, brickwork columns stood 
out, with every seventh brick in- 
dented an inch, so's to make them 
columns look pretty. Leadin' out 
from nigger-heaven, up near the 
top, a balcony extended over to 
the fancy-step brickwork columns. 
Mebbe that balcony wasn't as high 
as the Kahl buildin', but it seemed 
higher in them times. That step 
brickwork made fine toeholt, and, 
with the balcony, was ducksoup for 
little Jocko Kane, of Corkhill, the 
original human fly, and the first kid 
to climb the Burtis bricks. 

One evenin', when Kate Clax- 
ton was playin' "The Double Mar- 
riage," little Jocko climbed up the 
bricks to the balcony, stepped over 
the iron railin', raised the window, 
walked in, and took a ringside seat 
in nigger heaven. 
Say, sport — the kids that watched little Jocko make that 
first climb held their breath, thinkin' every minute he'd fall 
and be dashed to mincemeat on the , sidewalk. Later on 
they nerved up to climb the bricks, too, and some nights they 
had a regular percession. Got so Charlie Kindt hadta hire Jim 
Wafer, Tilebein, or some flydick, to mope around evenin's 
to keep theim boys from makin' the ascension. 




179 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

There was other ways of beatin' the gate at the Burtis, 
too — like sneakin' in on afternoons, and hidin' under the 
gallery benches 'til the show started. Hadta keep dam quiet, 
though, 'cause if Matt Lamb or old Joe Brown, the bill- 
poster, heard you cough or laugh, they'd hustle you out so 
quick it'd make yer head swim; 

Usta climb the high gate alongside the Kimball house 
sometimes, to slip through the laundry and crawl up under 
the stage. Then hadta watch a chance, when nobody was 
lookin', sneak up stairs past the actors' dressin' rooms, climb 
a ladder up under the roof, crawl along the rafters over the 
big dome — all dark as pitch — away out to the front of the 
theatre, and slip through a cubby-hole into nigger-heaven. 

Say, sport — if a kid ever missed his step or made a slip 
on that journey over the big dome, he'd a tumbled down 
through the plaster and splattered all over the dress circle. 

Then, on cold evenin's when kids was waitin' around 
and knockin' their heels together to keep 'em warm, mebbe 

Henry Kerker, Oscar Koehler, Ike 
Monk, Anthony Schuyler, or Dave 
Baker, or some other dandy good- 
hearted guy would blow along and 
ast Charlie Kindt would he let the 
whole mob in for a five-spot. When 
Charlie answered, "Slip me the 
cush," you'd think them young 
savages would tear the steps to 
pieces stampedin' for nigger-heaven. 
Then they was all set to holler 
"Su-up! Su-up!" when any home- 
towner helped out the barnstormers 
by carryin' a spear or sumpin. 
One evenin', when Haverly's minstrels was playin', 
Charlie was coachin' old Til in front of the show-shop, on 
how to stop the kids from climbin' the bricks, and old Jack 
Haverly was standin' there listenin' in on the gab. 

"Do you mean to tell me," ast old Jack, kinda aston- 
ished Uke, "that a youngster would risk his life climbin' them 
bricks just to see a show?" 




180 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Charlie said they was hundreds of 'em that would, and 
old Jack said: "Well, I'd just like to see 'em. Any boy 
that'll risk his life climbin' them bricks kin see my minstrel 
show free." 

Charlie Kindt then called little Jocko Kane, and told 
him Mister Haverly wanted to know would he climb the 
bricks, and little Jocko told Mister Haverly he would, pro- 
vided he'd let his gang climb with him. Old Jack Haverly 
laughed right out and said: "Sure thing, son — take all your 
gang with you." 

So one youngster gave little Jocko a h'ist and he started 
climbin' up, and all his gang follyed him, until it looked like 
a string of flies climbin' up them there brick columns. Jack 
Haverly said he'd be dad- jiggered if he ever seen anything 
like that in his hull life. But purty soon he noticed little 
Jocko startin' to make the second climb, and old Jack ast 
Charlie how that happened. Charlie told him little Jocko 
was makin' extra trips so's he could get return checks for 
some boys in his gang that didn't have the nerve to shoot 
the bricks. 

Then Mister Haverly said that while the offer didn't 
go for encores, he was satisfied that life wasn't worth much 
to a nervy youngster when there was a good minstrel show 
in town. 

Lotsa young fellers that hung around the Burtis in the 
old days, sport, kept their wits workin', and made good on 
big time latere — boys like Bee O'Day, Jimmy Doyle, Bob and 
Hughie Conwell, Roger Imhoff, Hal Skelly, and others. 

But there was one small chap nobody could understand 
— little Billy Johnston. When hardly big enough to toddle, 
he was hobnobbin* with actors and chummin' with Billy 
Messenger, a cullud boy. If a circus came to town, young 
Johnston was the first lad on the lot and the last to leave. 
He studied every street faker and marched with every band. 
Any kinda music sounded good to that youngster. 

One evenin', when Murray and Mack played the Burtis, 
little Billy said to Charlie Murray, "Some day you'll see my 
name on Broadway." Charlie laughed at the kid, and ast 



181 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Bert Leslie. 




"Steve Hogan. 



182 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

him what he could do to make Broadway. So little Billy 
did the song-and-dance, "StroUin' Through the Park" — right 

back there on the old Burtis stage. 
Charlie patted the youngster, to 
encourage him, and little Billy told 
Murray again, when he was leavin', 
"Some day you'll see my name on 
Broadway." 

William Albert Johnston got 
his start several years later with 
the Kickapoo medicine company, 
doin' a blackface version of "Stroll- 
in' Through the Park," at Tamaroa, 
Illinois. He peddled "Sagwa" and 
"Rattlesnake Oil" durin' intermis- 
sions, but never took any of the 
medicine hisself, because, as he said later, every time he 
sold a bottle it made him "gag." 

In Chicago, Billy worked around theatres, and later came 
to the front as a tramp comedian, tourin' the country under 
the stage name of Bert Leslie in his own creation of that 
celebrated character, "Steve Hogan." He was recognized as 
the slickest slangster on the stage. 

Later Bert Leslie made good on his boyhood boast — 
"Some day you'll see my name on Broadway" — when he 
starred with Trixie Friganzi in his own musical extravaganza, 
"Town Topics." The big scene of that show represented a 
rehearsal back on the old Burtis stage, with the Carbone 
Brothers, song-and-dance comedians, in "StroUin' Through 
the Park." It was a scream. 

In a Broadway cafe, one evenin', Charlie Murray ast 
Bert Leslie: "Why do you close your eyes when you drink 
whiskey?" And Bert replied, "I'm afraid if my eyes see it 
that it will make my mouth water and dilute the likker." 

Bert Leslie never had an opportunity to do his stuff 
in Davenport, but he never forgot the days when he usta 
climb the bricks at the Burtis. 

Them was the fine times, sport. Pat Walsh usta whistle 
"Garryowen" while hitchin' his bosses to start work at five 



183 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



o'clock in the mornin', Billy Petersen was hustlin' fifteen 
hours a day peddlin' matches as fast as his brother Henry 
could make 'em, J. J. Richardson was try in' to put all the 
ads top-of-column-next-to-readin'-matter in that paper of 
his'n, Billy Bettendorf w^as learnin' printin' by pumpin' a 
foottreadle on a job press, and little B. J. Palmer was showin' 
speed when the salesladies in Saint Onge's department store 
tapped their pencils on the showcases and hollered "Cash!" 

We had the spirit of seventy-six in real life in them times, 
too, with the finest drum corps that ever stepped down the 
line. L. P. Dosh was fifer, Gus Redding done the double-drag 
on the snare drum, and little Hank Brown whanged the bass 
drum with both hands. Them old boys was hard-boiled civil 
war vets, and when they got workin' you could feel electricity 
runnin' up and down your spine. 

There wasn't no ad clubs in them days, sport, but Bob 
Poole showed grocers howta ginger up business at his Brady 
street store. Old Bob stood in front of his counter, along- 
side a barrel of mixed candy, and handed each customer a 

little bag of candy. The winlmen 
flocked in there from Rockingham, 
Goosetown, Hamburg, Rogertown, 
Corkhill, and all points north, 
draggin' their kids, dolled in ging- 
ham and coppertoe shoes, to buy 
a bar of soap or sumpin, and get a 
bag of candy. They'd make halfa 
dozen calls, splittin' their orders 
so's they'd get a bag of candy each 
time. But old Bob only smiled, 
and when little tads held wishin' 
parties, mashin' their noses on the 
windows, he'd bribe 'em to move 
by givin' 'e^m a bag of candy. 
Mounted a platform, over their big factory, on Third, 
between Main and Harrison, Woeber Brothers had a big 
buggy for an advertisin' sign, that could be seen frolm all 
parts of town. Sears and Frizzell had a stuffed gray boss, 
all harnessed, to draw trade to their harness-shop. Other 




184 




THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

live merchants used stuffed bears, tigers, eagles, and buffaloes 
for come-on signs. 

Cigar-stores had cigarmakers workin' at the bench, and 
when a guy ast for a smoke the boss would say, "Light or 

dark?" — light cigars bein' milder 
than dark ones. They had injun- 
gal cigar-signs in front of their 
stores, too, Herman Jacker, Ernst 
Roddewig, Rudolph Priester, Harry 
Watt, Henry Ochs, John McSteen, 
Otto Albrecht, Charlie Brock- 
mann, and the Hermann Brothers 
havin' the swellest lookers. They 
hadta hide 'em evenin's, though, 
'cause lotsa stews would elope 
with 'em, carryin' 'em up to the old 
high school, or down to the levee. 
Bakers had spiral-spring bells 
on their doors, as in then times a baker done his own bakin' 
and clerkin'. When the bell clattered, he'd quit kneadin' 
dough 'cause he needed dough. Mrs. Partner, Robert Fab- 
ricius, Emil Pegelow, Bernhard Leemhuis, Caspar Schebler, 
Moore's Pioneer bakery, Korn's Pacific bakery, and Ulbricht's 
bakery had spiral-spring bells, and at noon and suppertime 
they hadta step lively, watchin' the bakin', and sellin' hot 
bread, sugar-cookies, frosted-creams, coffee-cake, and jelly- 
doughnuts. Usta plug doughnut holes with jelly then. Now 
see what they're usin'! 

The T. K. quartet set the pace in singin', their voices 
blendin' so naturally and easily. Them tomkatters took in 
Harry Dower, Art Atkinson, Ed Peck, and Lew Knocke for 
harmonizers, and in them freelunch days lotsa folks thought 
singin' was on the bill of fare. When there was any enter- 
tainin', some guy would call for the T. K.'s, and they always 
came to the front. When the T. K. combination laid off 
on the free list, the Clover quartet grabbed up the burden. 
Ed Parmele, Bob Osborn, Billy Christy, and Lew Susemiehl 
pooled their lung-power and entertained the natives for nine 
years before givin' up the ghost. 



185 



Old Jazzdad's Birthplace. 




AY, BOB — If any of you young fellers has 
got the idea that jazz music is new stuff, 
you kin take another guess for yourself. 
Us old timers knew the jazz daddy — the 
old bird that discovered this syncopatin' 
movement that starts all the shoulder- 
shakin' now'days. 

Old John Biehl, of Rock Island, was 
the first jazzbo — with his little b flat clari- 
net, and Charlie Bleuer helped that old 
trouper along with that work by pushin' 
groans, moans, and sobs through his slide 
trombone. Them two babies was the 
original jazzhounds, and they didn't need cowbells, banjoes, 
cuckoo clocks, nor boiler factories to cover up punk fakin' like 
these saint-vitus artists that mutilates melody in these times. 
Old John could make his squawstick cackle like a plymouth- 
rock rooster, squeal like a razorback porker, or whinney like 
a missouri mule. 

Old John had lotsa class as an imitator. 
In these speedy times, when a jazz professor organizes 
his herd, he draws on Watertown for a tromboner, on Mount 
Pleasant for a saxophoner, locoes a fordfixer for fid rasper, 
and ropes a clamdigger to wallop the planner. Then, bein' 
all set, a blinkey snowbird turns the music upside down, 
gives the high sign with the baton, and says, "C'mon, fellers 
— le's go!" And they're off! 

In the old days, when Emil Ziegler and Muz Reddick 
run dances at Miller's hall. Ruber's garden, and on the old 
Riverhorse to Offermann's island, John Biehl and his band- 
boys would play five or six encores for "Maggie Murphy's 
Home," as them Rock Island dancin' bugs never could get 
fed up on that tinkly tune about the little Murphy gal. 
They'd keep singin' — 



187 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

There's an organ in the parlor 

To give the house a tone. 
And you're welcome every e-ven-nin' 

At Maggie Murphy's Home. 

And the only way the jazzmaster could flag them dancin' 
radicals was to kiyi like a coon fleahound hittin' it up the 
alley with a can tied to his tail. Then Charlie Bleuer, Tony 
and George Biehl, and George Stroehle would join up with 
old John and give a correct invitation of nineteen twenty-two 
jazz as done in these times. 

In them days gals held up their long dresses with one 
hand when dancin', to keep 'em from trailin' and to help 
the eye-play of nosey ankle- 
spotters. They wore high 
collars, and, not knowin' 
nothin' about this neckin' 
and parkin', naturally they 
never got in touch with the 
real jazz punch these bob- 
haired sweeties puts ovei 
now'days. 

That's when Phil Mil- 
ler discovered that excitin' 
outdoor sport of grabbin' 
Davenport tinhorns on Sec- 
ond avenue for fast drivin 
with old wind-broken livery 
plugs that couldn't knock 
off a mile in eight-ten on a 
bet. Then our genial old 
Judge Cropper curried his 

whiskers and romped into the game with a dash of speed 
and sacked them yaps for the limit — the judge bein' a patri- 
otic guy and strong for upholdin' the peace and dignity of 
the grand old state of Illinois. 

Any of you newspaper boys ever heard of little Mike 
Radigan that usta jerk the lever on switch engine number 
six on the Peoria and Rock Island in the old days? Say, 
sport, there was the original whistlin' kid! Mike could 




188 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

chatter with the birds in their own language, and on Sundays 
when he rambled through the woods around Chippiannock 
and the Watch Tower, the robins and bobwhites knew that 
a real mechanic was takin' the air. Mike learned to whistle 
by listenin' in on the birds, and then he taught 'em some 
new tricks. 

All the youngsters was dippy about little Mike Radigan, 
and when he ditched his overalls and stepped outa the cab 
of number six, they usta folly him along the street and ast 
him wouldn't he please warble like the birdies. Little Mike 
packed a roUickin' triller, and when it come to whistlin' Irish 
jigs, and this trembly grand opera stuff, that little harp could 
certainly hit the ball. 

Ever heard who was the biggest man in Rock Island in 
the old days, sport? Well he was Bailey Davenport — big 
all over, up and down, and a long distance around. Lived in 
a big colonial mansion, with big pillars, in the big pasture 
on Seventh avenue and Seventeenth street, and when Gus 
Schlapkohl, the big coachman, drove up with the big landau 
and the big team of grays, and Bailey dropped into the big 
back seat, the big springs was all set and playin' to capacity. 
In them days, a five-pound chuck roast only set you back 
two bits. If you carried a basket and a dime to the slaugh- 
ter-house you'd get all the spareribs and pigsfeet you could 
cart away, with a half dozen pigtails throwed in, and you 
could get venison roasts, bear steaks, and buffalo cuts at any 
butcher shop. 

Harry Sage and Bert Cunningham was learnin' to play 
one-ol'-cat on back lots and cowpastures, and dreamin' of 
when they'd be bigleaguers. The watch factory was tickin' 
along near that thrivin' town of Camden, and when the con- 
stabule and the town council changed the name to Milan, 
Charlie Dibbern, Lothar Harms, Fred Appelquist, and Carl 
Mueller declared the name a hoodoo that would put the burg 
on the blink. 




189 




3 

u 



en 



g 2 



What Made Rock Island Great. 




Yes, indeed, sport — thettn was 
the good old days in Rock Island. 
Jack and Tom Greehey was hog- 
headin' freight on the Brooklyn 
division, Jack and Tom Pender 
kicked empties down the sidetrack 
in the Rock Island switchyards, 
and Pat and Johnny Murrin pulled 
the throttles on Saint Louis pass- 
enger trains on the Q. And, listen 
— what them six big huskies didn't 
know about railroadin' they couldn't learn from glommin' 
time-tables, nor from Ben Cable, nor from R R., nor even 
from Big Chief Kimball hisself. 

That's when the Hardly Able club had a fish and chow- 
der camp at Rock river, with some fine old stagers on its 
roster — guys like Buck O'Brien, Mule Rispen, Gibe Gibsen, 
Jumbo Kelly, Dutchy Rosenfield, Poke Lambert, Stuff Mc- 
Mahon, Ben Stempel, Nick Newcomb, Eddie Stempel, Dan 
Finnegan, Kit Atkinson, and a lota other stem-winders that 
would peel the shirt off'n their backs for a pal that was right. 
When Major Beardsley, Colonel Danforth, and Cy Dart 
clashed on "Ingersoll" at the Harms, Gottlieb, the barboy, 
said they was "sucha nice mans" it was stew bad they wasn't 
Chermans. Gottlieb went weepy about Walter Rosenfield 
bein' outaluck, too, but he stood pat on one proposition — 
Robert Wagner was a greater all-'round guy than Richard 
Wagner, the moosikbug. 

Stone-cuttin' was a regular profession, and Joe, Bob, and 
Charlie Evans, Bob and Tom Cox, Dick and Bill Lloyd, and 
other efficiency experts was trimmin' stone and eight hours 
at the big Arsenal store-houses, so that Uncle Sam would 
have some real honestagod buildin's ready when the big war 
started. 



191 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Jack Cady and Charlie Skinner was showin' the young 
trims of Moline how to do that new two-step dance, and 
George Huntoon drove his little roan and sidebar buggy up 
and down the avenue on sunny afternoons, tryin' out his 
lamps on long-distance work. 

Salsbury's Troubadors played two consecutive nights 
for Ben Harper at Harper's theatre, at fifty bucks per, with 
Nate Salsbury as top comedian. A buxom little gal in short 
skirts made a big hit with the gallery gods that packed nig- 
ger-heaven when she sang "The Torpedo and the Whale," 
and it's a ten-to-one shot there ain't an old timer that showed 

his mug in the jam that kin 
remember the name of that 
little gal. 

Don't s'pose you birds 
ever heard about Harry Mc- 
Darrah that usta be the 
whole works on the ferry 
boat. Harry was engineer, 
fireman, coalpasser, and the 
rouster. He usta brag that 
he could "Chubble more 
thuel than annie man that 
iver stud fernist a staimboat 
b'iler." No matter how cold 
the weather, Harry never 
v/ore a coat or vest, and 
always had his shirt sleeves 
rolled up to his shoulders. 
Harry's the boy that started 
the strenuous life business that T. R. got away with, by 
beginnin' work at four-thirty in the mornin' and knockin' off 
at nine-thirty in the evenin' — exceptin' when he rowed the 
ferry skiff on stormy nights, after Chin Lawhead or the reg- 
ular oarsmen got buck fever and laid down on the job. 

When Harry got tired workin' he'd bank his fires and 
mosey up to Ohlweiler's or Eckermann's, and after dustin' 
the high collar off'n a coupla big ones, he'd tell them lunch- 




192 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

grabber's and barflies all about the night of the big wind in 
Ireland. And Harry was some teller when he pulled up a 
few notches on his belt and took a drag at his clay pipe. 
When the ferry docked for winter, down at the boatyard, and 
Harry got through with his cleanin' and paintin', he'd cut 
ice in the slough or split cordwood down around Andalusia, 
just to keep in condish for the big openin' when the ice 
went out. When you hear these young sportin' guys brag 
about how them hunk and kike prize fighters is due to crack 
from over-trainin' by workin' two hours a day, tell 'em about 
the time Harry McDarrah done his day's stuff for a dollar- 
ten — and never a squawk outa him. 

Jim Maucker hammered out lightweight racin' shoes for 
the pacin' and trottin' bosses that speeded in the sleighin' 
races on Second avenue, and little Jimmy Thompson, the 
original boy deckative, was sproutin' the finger-print theory 
and workin' out his sherlock-holmes idea about "the eye that 
never winks nor sleeps." 

Mike McCool was hardenin' his muscles for the heavy- 
weight championship of the world, by learnin' how to draw 
six in one mitt at the Blackhawk saloon of Hughey the Hawk, 
and Hossler Jimmy Campbell hunched the roundheads at the 
Rock Island and Peoria roundhouse on the right dope for 
runnin' a railroad right up to snuff. 

Jimmy Mahoney introduced that "Hello, brother!" 
slogan in a rousin' campaign for alderman of the Second 
ward, where there was a coupla weak but dark-colored spots 
that needin' fixin'. Now all the prominent fraternal lodge- 
workers use that slogan when slippin' goof members the 
grip and puttin' over the secret work of the panhandle de- 
gree. The "Hello, sister!" version was exemplified later by 
Mush Marshall and Jim Lane to a full house at the Lincoln 
club, the degree team paradin' with axes and full regalia. 

Webb Leas was wise-cracker at Plunk's boardin' house, 
where plain and fancy chuck was dished up for three bucks 
a week. Webb's job as official argufier was contested by 
Skip Day, and when them two birds locked horns on politics, 
they hiked up to Cap Corcoran's shave-shop for a decision or 
a draw. Webb shook a nasty elbow when razzin' the sec- 



193 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




ond fid, and he never run outa gas when gabbin' about honin' 
razors or can-shootin' with SUm McCormick, Shorty Wil- 
liams, Johnny Meehan, or the other boys 
that soldiered at Buford's plow factory. 
Plow-fittin' was the best trade in them 
days, and when a kid got strong enough 
to help out with the family larder he'd 
land at Buford's, at plow-fittin', grindin', 
or moldin', and think it was soft pickin's. 
Topsy Siemon was slug three at the Argus on Seven- 
teenth street, poundin' up bourgeois, at twenty-five cents a 
thousand ems, from horace-greeley writin' that Harry Simp- 
son hung on the hook, not havin' any typewriters in them 
days. Eli Mosenf elder started to learn job printin', but 
when he learned it was easier to grab the jack by buyin' 
printin' than by sellin' it, he chucked the job and started a 
clothin' store. 

Frank Wheelan was typesticker on the Union, and he 
sprinkled lotsa commas through Burdette's english joke 
column. When the weekly was printed on Thursdays, Bur- 
dette grabbed the first sheet that Adam Kramer run off on 
the old Potter press, and squatted on an ink keg in the alley 
to enjoy hisself laughin' at real comic stuff. Exceptin' a 
coupla razberries that plowed corn out near Reynolds, the 
only guys that could squeeze a titter on them english puns 
was Walter Johnson, Merc Driffill, Jonas Bear, and Johnny 
Dindinger. Folks had a dark suspish that Johnny Ding was 
oullin' old-time bull when he cackled at them johnny-bull 
wheezes. Ding bein' a tol'able kidder in them days. 




194 




The Dope on Chief Black Hawk. 

You kin tell the world, sport, that Rock Island had the 
ace of the old timers. Big Chief Black Hawk was the darb 
that led 'em all, and these picher painters has got that injun 
boy wrong. Mebbe you've seen the oil 
paintin' that shows the Big Chief squatted 
in front of his wigwam, takin' a solemn drag 
on his pipe, a bunch of squaws stirrin' a 
soup kettle, and a stream of smoke oozin' 
up in the air. And mebbe you got the idea 
that the big red boy was goin' to have dog- 
soup for supper. To make that picher look 
romantic, like the movies, the painter guy 
said the Big Chief was broadcastin' smoke 
signals to the braves around Coal Valley and Taylor Ridge, 
tellin' 'em everything is jake on the Watch Tower, crops is 
lookin' fine, and give our regards to all the folks. 

Not so. Black Hawk wasn't brewin' dog-soup, sport. 
He was operatin' a heap big ten-gallon still, and workin' up 
a batch of prime corn hooch that gauged 
two-hundred and ten mule-proof, it bein' 
falltime and the corn was ripe and juicy. 

When the Sacs and Foxes saw that 
smoke signal they got foxy — 'cause they 
knew the Star Old Timer was slippin' again, 
and that he'd get properly likkered durin' 
the evenin', bust up a coupla pigeon-toed 
squaws, and start an oldtime ballyhoo all up 
and down the reservation. 

Then, with a splittin* holdover the next 
mornin', he'd hit the warpath and paint the 
Rock river valley a skyblue-pink. Proba- 
bly you heard how them injun braves was fleet-footed and 
could run all day without stoppin' for feed or water. Well, 
they hadta step lively when Big Chief Black Hawk yelped his 




195 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




blood-curdlin' warcry, all soused to the ears, and hit the trail. 
That's why them big injuns built the big cave on the Arsenal 
at the end of the bridge — so's they could dig in when the Big 
Chief was rampagin'. 

That name Black Hawk has some punch, 
sport, and lotsa detective agencies, drugstores, 
hotels, mattress factories, garages, nearbeer 
joints, and chemical companies are named in 
honor of the Big Chief. 

When Rock Island was Suitcase Metrop- 
olis of the West, a lota Davenport shortchange 
specialists joined the caravan to that burg to help make the 
world safe for guys that lifted high ones or needed a shot in 
the arm. They volunteered to help the natives take care of 
visitors that flocked in from Strawberry Point, Oquawka, 
Letts, Low Moor, and all points west. 

Any guy havin' a loose piece of change in his kick 
could certainly get wholesome entertainment. 

Them was the good old days, sport, and Second avenue 
was shinin' brighter than Broadway or Coney island. 

If Rock Island could sidestep the Volstead proposition 
now, and stage a suitcase comeback, they'd need a coupla 
thousand traffic cops to line up flivs that would roll in from 
the wilds of lowa and the Dakotas. They could add two 
million to the population in six months, and cover the corn- 
fields of Rock river valley with bungalows and swiss villas 
crowded away to the roof with snowbirds and 
thirst-breakers, 

Lotsa guys in Rock Island is belly-achin' 
about highcost of cobweb gowns and ohboy 
stockin's that their dames is ringin' up on 
charge account, and they're tryin' to skimp on 
the eats by plantin' radishes and lettuce in 
their back yards. If them saps had the noodle 
of a jack-rabbit they'd plant fig trees and get 
in on next year's styles before the New York 
frogs and kikes comer the figleaf market. 
Them's the birds that'll tell the ladies what kinda togs they 
kin wear next summer. 




196 



The Volunteer Fire Laddies. 




IREMEN don't enjoy theirselves like 
they usta in the days of the volunteer 
department, sport. Now'days they ain't 
no fire bells ringin', nor no listenin' for 
the waterworks whistle, nor no people 
runnin' down the street hollerin' "Fi-ur! 
Fi-ur!" 

In the old days firemen was slow 

gettin' started, but when they got to 

a fire there was sumpin doin'. Now the 

fiivcart and chemical whizzes down the line like an airplane, 

and a blaze ain't got no chance whatever. 

The old church at Fifth and Rock Island was the favorite 
fire-spot, as it usta break out with a fire at least once a year. 
One mornin' when 'Fcnse Arnould was drillin' to work, he 
seen smoke oozin' outa the old church. 'Fonse rushed down 
the street yelpin' "Fi-ur! Fi-ur!" Patsey McNerny and Bill 
Kleinfelder joined him, racin' for the Fire King ingine house 
in Commercial alley, it bein' a big honor to be first to ring 
the fire bell. Matt Fisher and Ward Phillips beat 'em to it, 
though, and was jerkin' the bell-ropes like all-harry when 
'Fonse, Patsey, and Bill came rompin' in gaspin' for breath. 

Bill Gallagher and Pat Hennessey came licketycut down 
Perry street, hollerin, "Fi-ur! Fi-ur!" drivin' the two big fire 
bosses that was boarded in Bob Porter's barn. Marsh Noe, 
all outa wind, came rushin' in, follyed by Johnny Schmidt and 
Bob Littler, to light the fire under the ingine boiler, so's the 
Fire King could blow her whistle ahead of the Donahue and 
be first to get up steam. 

Hearin' the Fire King bell ring. Otto Klug and Ignatz 
Schmidt raced from Otto Volkland's lunch-table to the Liberty 
hosehouse, and Chris Von Doehren, Henry Korn, and Boney 
Strathman all rushed to the Rescues, to ring the bells, all 
them guys hollerin' "Fi-ur! Fi-ur!" Then the Alerts, Hopes, 



197 









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THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



Mount Idas, Pilots, First Wards, and other companies chimed 
in with their bells, givin' a finer concert than the Swiss bell- 
ringers. 

Milt Rowser, Frank Boyler, Dick Kelly, and Hen Cooper 
was enjoyin' a game of seven-up at Cal Witherspoon's when 
the alarm sounded, and in the excitement they rushed out 
without settlin'. 

The Fire King bein' the only company that knowed where 
the fire was, them other companies hadta wait for the water- 
works whistle to blow so's they'd get the number of the ward. 

In them times, if the waterworks whistle blowed one 
long blast, it was a signal that the fire was out, and then them 
fire laddies would stick around to chew about -where they was 
and what they was doin' when the alarm sounded, givin' all 
the details. Bein' as the boss couldn't dock 'em when called 
on fire duty, they did some whoppin' story-tellin' every time 
they was called to a fire. 

It took lotsa time for the Fifth Wards to get started 
that day, sport. Louis Arnould, the foreman, was shinglin' 
a roof for Andy Roach when the King's bell rung, and Mick 
Delaney, Dinny Hickey, Henny Higgins, Jim Gabon, 'Gene 
Deutsch, Billy Oakes, Mike Heeney, Jim Leonard, Fete Gil- 
looley. Jack Cavanaugh, Gil Arnould, Joe Dugan, and Bryan 
Toher was scattered all over town, workin' at their trades, but 
at the first crack of the bell they dropped their tools to hot- 
foot it to the hosehouse. 

Humba Kelly, first torchboy, was stickin' type on the 
Blue Ribbon News, and he bolted out the door without wait- 
in' to space out his line or say a word to Ed Collins, the 
foreman. Grunter O'Donnell, second 
torchboy, jumped off Lillis's grocery 
wagon, and hung up a new record 
sprintin' to the hosehouse. 

Dan McFarland, assistant fore- 
man, was tappin' wheels on the Rocky 
Mountain limited at the Perry street 
depot, and he trun his hammer to Tom 
Behan and Johnny Cody, and rushed 
home for his silver plated trumpet, red 




199 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

shirt, and castiron hat, as Dan always worked in full uniform 
when firefightin'. Firemen in them times was alv/ays braver 
when they had time to 'tend to their make-up. 

Foreman Arnould was a sticker for system with the Fifth 
Wards, and wouldn't let them lads start for a fire till they 
knew where it was, no matter how restless they got, nor how 
hard they pulled on the hosecart rope. "Wait 'til you hear 
the waterworks whistle!" was the orders he blasted through 
his silver-plated trumpet. He called the roll that day, and 
everybody answered exceptin' Larry McKee, he bein' down 
at Columbus Junction kickin' off empties on a side-track. 

When the waterworks whistle blowed five times, it wasn't 
no time at all 'til them Fifth Wards came tearin' around the 
corner at Fifth and Iowa — the foreman and assistant foreman 




"Wait 'til you hear the waterworks -whistle I" 

roarin' out important orders through their silver-plated trum- 
pets — that company bein' tied with the Northwest Davenports 
and East Davenport Pilots for last place in the race. 

Them firemen was all outaluck that day, for some little 
guy, weighin' about one-twenty, strapped a babcock extin- 
guisher on his back, dumb a ladder, crawled along the roof, 
took a coupla squirts at the blaze, and the fire was all over 
exceptin' the big postmortem confab of them gallant firemen. 

That Fifth Ward company was a sore outfit, sport, bein' 
all set to show the people what kinda fire-fighters they was, 
not even havin' to unreel the hose, nor givin' Dinny Hickey 



200 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

and Bryan Toher a chance to make their famous lightnin' 
coupHn'. So they held a long session and then eased over 
to Bobby Garvey's, parked the hosecart in front of Bobby's 
summer-garden, and put in the day blowin' high collars offa 
crusaders, and takin' a good rest before drillin' up the hill 
with the hosecart. 

Old John Gundaker and Ben Raphael usta kid the fire- 
men, tellin' about the fire-fightin' days with the old hand- 
pump machine that was kept in city hall alley or Brady, 
between Fifth and Sixth, right alongside the big cistern the 
draymen kept filled with water they brought from the river 
in their big barrels to be used for fire fightin'. 

On firemen's meetin' night in the old days the fire bells 
would ring three taps — ding! dong! ding! — kinda doleful and 
solemn, to call the firemen to special meetin', so's they'd have 
an excuse to get away from the fireside battle-ground. Then 
they'd sit around and smoke scraps, rush the growler, and 
argue about what brave things they thought they done the 
time of the big fires at Hill's opera house, Beattie's mill, the 
ropewalk, and the Glucose works. When they got lit up 
and properly mellowed, they'd brag about how many tickets 
they was goin' to peddle at the saloons for their sixth grand 
annual social ball and benefit entertainment that was to be 
held the next winter, or they'd dope pipe-dreams about how 
their company would skin all the other companies for first 
prize on firemen's parade day. 

Never heard what become of the fire bells of the old 
days, didya, sport? Well, B. J. gathered 'em in, gave 'em 
an adjustment, and lined 'em up for chimes in that cupola 
of his at the top of the hill. Now, when B. J. needs exercise, 
instead of playin' golf or buck-passin', he tries his hand on 
"Annie Laurie" by ringin' them old fire bells. The Fire 
King bell is tuned to carry the air, the Alerts for the tenor, 
the Hopes takes the high notes, the Rescues the baritone, the 
Libertys the bass, and the Fifth Wards and Pilots 'tends to 
the barber-chords and accidentals. If some of them square- 
heads had figured on harmonizin' them fire bells in the old 
days, fire laddies coulda romped to blazes to the tune of 
one of Sousa's marches, or to "Doncha Hear Them Bells." 



201 




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Pioneer Work in Cubist Art» 

Them was he good old days, sport. That's when Charlie 
Russell usta grind out "Breakfast Slices'' on the first page 
of the old Gazette, for eight bucks a week. After puttin' up 
halfa column of paragraphs, Charlie filled the column with 
"News Summary," in leaded nonpareil. 
When Dave Rohm, the foreman, hung 
that "fat take" on the hook, Tim 
Hickey, Gus Brooks, Patsey McGlynn, 
Bill Axtman, George Bailey, Henry 
Pfabe, and the other printers would pull 
out for it, as they was settin' solid 
brevier at two bits a thousand ems. 
Charlie Russell was soft panhandlin' for 
the old typo tourists, and his copy was easy to read, but his 
dad's writin' looked like it was done by Harry Simpson, and 
that kinda henscratchin' drove many a type-sticker to drink. 
Bird Richardson drove the first automobile on the streets 
on the fourth of July, nineteen-hundred-one, and him and his 
gang gave the natives the surprise of their lives. 

There wasn't no screwy yaps hangin' around then to 
say "I personally," but late one Saturday night when John 
Hasson was goin' home with his usual, he dared the soldier 
to come down off the monument to fight, and John got away 
with his bluff. 

Lafe and Walt Lancaster were the cleverest all-'round 
acrobats in the burg, and no entertainment was complete 
without Lafe and Walt on the program doin' their grind. 

Joe Hebert usta sing "Nancy Lee," with that fine bari- 
tone voice of his'n, and he wasn't stingy with it. In the 
home-talent show of "Pinafore," Joe took the part of Sir 
Joseph Porter, makin' a big hit singin' : 

When I was a lad I served my term 

As office boy in an attorney's firm, 

I washed the w^indows and I scrubbed the floor, 

And I polished up the handle of the big front door. 



203 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



An old rounder complained to Nick Newcomb one time 
that he couldn't get any work. Nick hired him for three 
bucks a day to take a brick in each hand, carry 'em across the 
street, set 'em down, pick 'em up, carry 'em back, and then 
repeat. At the end of the second day, Nick hadta hire two 
extra barkeeps to moisten curious folks that laid off at the 
Eagle works and the sawmills to watch the brick man work. 

Dad Lower drove his speedy pacer, "Captain Jinks," 
along Second street, and all the other hossmcn hadta take 
his dust. Waiter gals at the Commercial house would call 
"ram-lamb-sheep-or-mutton" on the bill of fare, and saloons 
kept eight-day matches in big stone matchboxes at the end 
of the bar. 

Jim Rhodes usta laugh and ast, "What is your corpor- 
osity and how do you sagashiate?" when he'd shake flippers 
with a brother oddfellow or an axe-carryin' member of the 
woodmen degree team. 

Steeplejack Oscar Wiley would stand on his head on a 
smokestack and holler like a kickapoo when he was stewed, 
and people expected to see him get killed, Oscar wasn't in 
no hurry, though, for he waited patiently about to let nature 
and Barleycorn take the regular course. 

Smokey Reese blowed a cornet when he drilled down the 
street with his chimney-sweep makeup, high cone-shaped 
skimmer, rope and tackle. He could 
go through a chimney like a swallow, 
and chimney-soot had a fat chance 
when Smokey got on its trail. 

George Bagley, express messenger 
on the Rock Island road, wanted to get 
rich quick, so he stepped off the train 
with a hundred thousand dollars in 
greenbacks in a gunny sack, walked up 
to Kellogg's barn at Sixteenth and 
Iowa, and cached it under the hay. That's gettin' it fast, 
sport. The train stopped for a half hour in them days and 
George had plenty time to get back and take his place before 
the train pulled out. When that stack of long-green was 




204 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

checked up missin', George was put through the third degree, 
but he had an alibi as long as a hophead's dream. A week 
later, when everybody was talkin' about the great robbery 
mystery, George weakened, coughed up, steered the railway 
dicks to the plant, and then done his stretch at the big house. 
George said havin' so much jack worried him, and he couldn't 
sleep nights. Ralph Cram passed Kellogg's barn twice a 
day in them times, but he never even stopped to take a feel 
of that gunnysack with the hundred grand under the hay. 

Although they wasn't no art school in the old days, sport, 
we had some fine animal painters that ain't never been rekan- 
ized by the elight of this burg. Mebbe it ain't too late to 
give credit to one buddin' young artist that painted a zebra 
by moonlight one evenin', without ever 
takin' any art lessons, except helpin' 
Joe Hines paint a corncrib out on Jer- 
sey Ridge road. 

When Captain Lon Bryson was 
agent for the Diamond Jo steamboat 
line, he usta drive a hoss named Dolly, 
that he kept in his barn at Sixth and 
Tremont. That hoss was an all-white 
nag, and her and the cap was awful 
pally. Dolly wasn't strong for speed, but when the cap drove 
her down to the steamboat office the kids was kept busy spit- 
tin' for the white hoss, so's they'd have good luck. 

One evenin' Ira Lingafelt, Tom Hooper, and Jack Mullins 
was easin' home from a dance, and they frisked a can of black 
paint from Tom Slattery at the old Rock Island repair shops. 
"What to do?" ast Ira, not bein' sleepy nor nothin', and them 
three lads went into conference. Hearin' a hoss whinney, 
they knew it was Cap Bryson's Dolly, and thinkin' mebbe she 
was lonesome, they dropped in for a call at three o'clock in 
the momin'. Dolly was tickled pink. So they backed the 
old mare outa the manger, and Jack Mullins took holt of the 
halter and begun whisperin' baby hoss-talk into her ear, sayin' 
"Nice ol' Dolly!" and stuff like that. Tom Hooper played 
lookout, to give the alarm in case the cap should happen to 
start any sleep-walkin'. 




205 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Then Ira took that black paint and done a finer job of 
paintin' than old man Rembrandt ever dreamed of. A streak 
of black decorated every other white rib of Dolly, with black 
streamers over her back and flanks, wide black stripes around 
her legs, and big black spots on her neck. When Ira finished 
the art work on Dolly, she made a finer-lookin' zebra than 
any that Barnum had in his big menagerie — exceptin' that she 
looked like a leopard from the neck up. Them kids took a 
moonlight inspection of the old mare, and they agreed that 
Ira was gifted with the divine fire. 

But some folks, sport, is shy on artistic taste, and it 
happened that Cap Bryson was one of them kinda guys. He 
didn't appreciate art nor paintin', and when he clapped his 
peepers on old Dolly the next mornin', all striped and spotted, 
he went straight up. The cap made an awful beller to Chief 
Kessler, and offered the large reward of five bucks for the 
arrest and conviction of the culprit, the cap not discriminatin' 
between a classy artist and a common culprit. 

When that paint dried on old Dolly it fell off and took 
the hair with it, givin' the old mare a black-and-tan zebra 
effect. Every time the cap looked at old Dolly he burned 
up, and he kept his reward of five bucks posted at the hoose- 
gow, hopin' to land the culprit. 

A number of years later, when Ira Lingafelt was visitin' 
in the old town, he met Cap Bryson one day, and ast him 
did he ever land the guy that put old Dolly through the zebra 
degree. "No," said the cap, flarin' right up, "but if I ever 
do, I'll prosecute him promptly and to the full extent of the 
law." 

Then Ira took the first train to Chicago, and he ain't 
never been seen around these diggin's since. 




206 



Thuthie Thmither'th Thilly Vertheth. 

When we had heatless days and lightless nights, picher 
shows and pivot places were put off watch six days and nights 
each week, and Httle Susie Smithers assembled her woes in 
sad verse for the benefit of Sam Greenebaum of the Garden 
theatre. Susie lisped, and after she got through punchin' her 
typewriter her verses read this way: 

Thay, Tham— lithen! 

There'th not a thingle plathe to go 

Thinthe you clothed your thwell picher thhow. 

Gee whith! I feel tho thad and blue — 

My tholdier guy he'th got the flu. 

I theldom thwear, but I'll thay "Damn 

The Kaither!" Don't you thay tho, Tham? 

It alwayth maketh thome hit with me 
When I thtroll down the thtreet and thee 
A cutie mith that'th out for bear, 
Drethed like a horthe, with henna hair. 
Thure thing ! each tholdier tipth hith lid. 
And thmearth the thalve to thith thwell kid. 

Your night- thchool clath ith cauthing pain ! 

When thome poor nut thpellth for hith jane 

The adth and titleth on the thcreen — 

Out loud — I want to butht hith bean. 

May I thuggetht, to tholve thethe puthleth. 

That thethe thmart thpellerth uthe fathe muthleth. 

The jack you thpend for gatholine 

To run that thwell big limouthine 

Mutht thet you back thomie dithtanthe ; and 

The way you thpeed ith thomething grand! 

There'th not a buth that you let path — 

I'll tell the folkth, you thhow thome clath! 



207 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Your organitht playth out of date; 
Hith thtuff don't theem appropriate, 
'Cauthe, when the hero winth the doll, 
It'th "Mendelthon'th" he playth. That'th all! 
The betht noithe for a thlipping brother 
Ith "Jutht Before the Battle, Mother." 

It'th fierthe! My girl friendth are tho jealouth 

Becauthe tho many tholdier fellowth 

Keep chathin' me. It ith a fright — 

I cop thome thwell guy every night. 

I thurely ought to be athamed — 

But, goodneth thaketh! thould I be blamed? 

Your movie thhop, it theemth to me, 

Thould have a nurthe and nurthery 

To thave our nerveth, increathe our joyth, 

And thlip the lid on daddy'th boyth. 

Then, when thethe thmart kidth thtart to beller, 

Jutht thlide 'em to the nurth'ry thellar. 

Our little Mary'th O! tho thweet! 

Thhe hath the other thtarth all beat. 

Don't thay I'm thilly or a nut 

To want to play in movieth, but, 

With thome nithe hero, I'll thay thith — 

I'd thhow thpeed with that vampire kith. 

When Ethie Joneth — the'th my girl chuim — 
Ballth me, I'll thay the'th going thome. 
Latht night Eth thaid, "Your tholdier guy 
Ith thure in bad — the town'th bone dry." 
But I thopped Eth. I said, "O ! ith he ! ? ! 
Mine'th got your'th thkinned; he ain't no thithy!" 

When Charlie regithterth thurprithe. 

Then thlamth the cheethe and cuthtard pieth, 

And thoakth the villian on the bean, 

I clap my handth and thtart to thcream; 



208 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

But when the gloomth are on the job, 
I lothe control, and thoftly thob. 

Not knocking, Tham, but my chum'th furth 
Took thome bird'th coin — it wathn't berth. 
While I aint pothing ath a thaint, 
I'll thay Mith Eth can thmear the paint. 
Believe me, Tham, it'th been thome yearth 
Thinthe thhe uthed thoapthudth in her earth. 

The thlob I thlave for thaid to me: 
"Mith Thue, pleathe can that pote-eree." 
Tho I quit cold. Thay — lithen here! 
I'd thurely make a thwell cathhier, 
'Cauthe I've got thenthe, and aint no floothey. 
Well— tho long, Tham. 

Thintherely, 

Thuthie. 




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Pretzel Alley. 




In the old days, sport, birthday 
celebrations were very popular, and 
Aleck Anderson had a birthday party 
at least once a week. That's how 
the Free and Independent Common- 
wealth of Pretzel Alley, State of 
Scott County, U. S. A., originated. 
Aleck was first, last, and only mayor 
of Pretzel Alley. 

One day Aleck met the Korn 
boys — Bill, Charlie, Otto, Harry, and 
John — and ast them^ wouldn't they 
slip up to his wigwam that evenin', 
as he was givin' a birthday party. 

A Baby Beaver. j^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^ g-jj j^^^^ ^^^^ 

bushy hair on his knob and silky whiskers like a baby beaver, 
and Bill said to Aleck: "Why, you old sardine! You had a 
birthday last week, and two the week before. Seems like 
you're tryin' to skin old Methusaleh on his record?" Aleck 
answered, "Can't lose." 

That evenin', when the guests lined up for dutch lunch, 
the icebox was loaded for bear, and any wetware mentioned 
on Roddewig's or Haase's price list was on the 
sideboard. When them boys got through sing- 
in' and dancin'. Bill Korn proposed organizin' 
Pretzel alley, and after he outlined his plan the 
proposition went over with a bang. An election 
was held on the spot, and to start the ball rollin' 
Aleck was elected mayor. On takin' the chair, 
Aleck appointed each of his guests to an office — 
from treasurer to dog-ketcher, from alley clerk 
to sexton, and from chief of police to alley 
scavenger. Nobody was overlooked while 
Aleck had the appointin' fever. "Can't lose," 
he declared, as the party broke up at five o'clock. 




211 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 





Then Pretzel alley 
started out to become 
famous. A newspaper 

reporter spilled the news, and the alley, from 
Main to Harrison, between Third and Fourth, 
became the gayest streak in the town. 

Pretzel alley had two political parties, the 
weiners and pretzels, and the politicians put 
over sdme redhot campaigns. The mayor appeared at council 
meetin' one evenin' in full regalia, and whispers of big graft 
in alley affairs got started, his nobs bein' accused of shakin' 
down gams, street laborers, utility guys, and sports. Folks 
started askin', "Where did he get it?" — and Aleck answered, 
"Can't lose." The mayor blowed ten thousand smackers on 
his second election, the greatest mudslingin' campaign in 
the history of Pretzel alley. 

A flag-raisin' was held before that election, after a torch- 
light percession that marched all around town, a rube band 
furnishin' the music. Spread-eagle speeches and political 
promises, scrambled with music and vaudeville, marked that 
election, Aleck bein' again elected unan- 
imously 

The Pretzel alley volunteer fire de- 
partment was organized, with Charlie 
Korn for chief and Philly Sonntag for 
assistant, and they gave an exhibition 
one evenin' for the benefit of the Dav- 
enport city council and fire department. 
The Pretzel firemen showed skill at lad- 
der cljmbin', hosecart foot-racin', and 
fancy couplin'. Havin' borryed a fire- 
man's red shirt and cast-iron hat, the 
chief showed how to play ragtime on 
his trumpet. A fire broke out in a three- 
story buildin' durin' that exhibition, and 
a distracted mother rushed to the chief 
cryin', "Who will save me che-ild?" The 
chief answered, "I, the chief of Pretzel 
ouor tijr fflaiiin alley fire department, will save your 



(£ai\I iCiii'P 




212 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




che-ild!" Then he run up a 
ladder, through smoke and 
flames, seized the child, and 
hurled it safely into a fishnet 
held by his brave firemen, A 
mighty cheer burst from the 
crowd at the heroic deed, and 
the chief ast everybody into 
Schiller Rice's storehouse to 
smother a frahmsize 

Lawyers, doctors, bank- 
ers, flimmers, actors, bakers, 
shell-workers, politicians, jan- 
itors, grifters, tree-trimmers, 
and other professional men 
flocked to Pretzel alley, to 
hold up their left hand and 
swear loyalty to the flag of 
the pretzel, and to renounce all allegiance to foreign kings, 
queens, jacks, and deucespots. 

The first primary election was held in Dad French's 
barn, rigged up with votin' booths, election officials, and reg- 
istration books. Frank McCullough popped in to register, 
and was escorted to a votin' booth with sawdust floor, cov- 
erin' four inches of water, and Frank said, "Darn!" when 
the shine on his patent-leathers was spoiled. Then Frank 
laughed and showed he was qualified to become a citizen of 
Pretzel alley, as he stepped back to watch Beans Hanssen, 
Ossie Hill, Billy Petersen, Con Murphy, Max Heyer, Dick 
Kelly, and other citizens step on the sawdust floor. 

Doc McClurg put one over on the registration board 
that evenin', though, when he breezed in to register, with 
rubber boots, raincoat, and umbrel. Seein' they couldn't 
moisten Doc on the outside, the registration board worked 
on the inside, and the weatherman hoisted the rain-flag when 
Doc plowed home that evenin'. 

At the annual election of Pretzel alley, held in the Hotel 
Davenport ballroom, there was intense excitement over the 



213 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




election of city scavenger. Charlie Caswell had held that 

office, but growed tired of answerin' telephone calls regardin' 

the location of dead - 

cats, dogs, billy-goats, "^ ^^,^HT HakE ME Fi 

coons, and other duties , . ^, 

requirin' the attention 

of the alley scav. If a stew-party slowed 

down along about sunrise in the mornin', 

some guy would get original and ring up 

Cas to tell him a garbage barrel was doin' 

a silent-noise solo down in Pretzel alley, 

or a hunka limburger and a punk onion 

was playin' a stockyards duet behind the 

pickle foundry, 

Charlie Kindt and Paul Lagomarcino 
were nominated for that important office, and it was plain 
that Charlie had the jump on Paul, and would win hands 
down when it came to a vote. Charlie delivered a great 
speech, implorin' his friends to vote for Paul, havin' in mind 
the woes of Cas while holdin' that exalted office. 

Emmet Sharon, Billy Chamberlin, and Lew Roddewig 
spread-eagled in favor of Charlie, but after Paul got down 
on his knees and prayed, beggin' his friends to vote for 
Charlie, there was nothin' to it — the show-shop boy won 
hands down. That night Charlie hopped the train for Palm 
Beach for a month's vacation. At the next meetin' of the 
alley council the mayor abolished the office of alley scav. 

Pretzel alley published an official organ. The Wurst- 
Blatt, for one consecutive week, while operatin' the rathskel- 
ler at the Turner fair, and annually thereafter. The Wurst- 
Blatt published official proceedings of the alley council, the 
annual reports of alley officers, and the poetry of Barney 
Squires, tree-trimmer and poet-lariat. 

One big event of Pretzel alley was the parade of the 
Pretzel alley press club, escorted by the Pretzel alley silver 
cornet band, with the mayor, editors, and correspondents of 
the Wurst-Blatt dolled in official regalia. That parade created 
a sensation, as it escorted Jack Johnson, his white wife, and 



214 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

the white man's hope to the steamer Morning Star for the 
froHc of the Tri-City press club. 

Some fine old scouts held office in Pretzel alley, sport — 
guys like Charlie Steel, Oscar Raphael, Doc Middleton, Bill 
Hickey, Pink Dillig, Billy Chambers, Rud Conrad, George 
Martin, Lovin' Henry, Art Kelly, Emil Berg, Al O'Hern, Dad 
French, Doc Raben, Mannie Adler, Charlie Caswell, Lee 
Daugherty, Ott Paulsen, Pete Petersen, Schiller Rice, Charlie 
Becker, Hans Schraam, Billy Harrison, Max Ruben, Harry 
Spencer, Phil Daum, Aleck Roberts, Fred Brooks, Red Heeney, 
Al Mueller, Brady Thompson, Tony Moore, Jim Gorman, 
John Ruhl, Jimmy Cahill, Ed Carroll, Ben Geertz, Harry Man- 
gan, Barney O'Neill, Harry Winters, George Scott, John 
Sorenson, George Dempsey, Chub Thompson, Billy Clancy, 
Hugo Moeller, Jack Marinan, Butter Kuehl, Al Goldschmidt, 
Pink Meinert, Charlie Hild, Billy Noth, Frank Sammons, and 
Doc Stoecks. 

When the city council changed Pretzel alley to Library 
street, that thoroughfare began to slip, and when the moisture 
exchanges at the east and west end closed, Pretzel alley 
turned up its toes, leavin' nothin' behind but memories of the 
good old days. 




215 



Come Back to Pretzel Alley. 



Noise — "Come Back to Erin" merged with "Fatherland." 

In Pretzel Alley, Heiney Stein, the leader of the band. 
Was hunched by the gesang-verein from far off Fatherland, 

That all his Uncle Fritz's gelt — a billion marks or so 

Was left him, with the tighwad belt, when Uncle made his blow. 
Then Heiney kissed his lieber schatz, to make gay Berlin bloom. 
With sij^zling red the highest spots he smeared his Unc's mazume. 
But Gretchen at the pretzel stand grew grumpy with the blues. 
For when she took her pen in hand she spilled this style of news: 

Chorus: 
"Come back to Pretzel Alley, where onion blossoms bloom, 
Limburger cheese flings to the breeze its beautiful perfume. 
There's but one place for sicha face in all the Wapsie Valley, 
So howld your tin, you'll nade it whin you light in Pretzel Alley." 

But Heiney thought his jane too gay. He wrote — "Dear Wooden Shoes: 

I'll not come back to old P. A. to battle squirrel juice. 

I'm ducksoup for this Berlin noise, and getting johnny-wise. 

Say, listen — with the army boys I spiel *em, "Hoch! der Kaisel" 

But Gretchen stung him with this fact — she feared he would get nicked — 

"You're slated for a sucker act! Old sport! Du bist verichtl 

I long to take you for that cush, a live one — not a shine — 

With the old Pretzel Alley push, a knockout for a Stein." 




216 



■m 



Steve Gilman's Nimrods. 




OT BRAGGIN', sport, but before these 
hundred per cent yaps got holdin' effi- 
ciency picnics to give the false-alarms 
an airin', we had some fine social clubs. 
That was before the guardian's union 
put the screws to the good-times party 
— when Jim Hanley organized the Le- 
Claire exiles; when Warren Teele was 
custodian of the ground-hog and first- 
guesser for ground-hog day ; when the 
old settlers held basket picnics in Far- 
num street woods or on Mitchell's hill. 
Golf and skat hadn't arrived as chronic diseases, the 
Wapshanis club was in the dream stage, and the Sawmill 
boys, Holders, Friedegg, Dirty Dozen, Company Q, Cigar- 
makers, Idlewilds, and Ivy Leaf social clubs were goin' full 
blast. Them dances was held at the "Stockyards," sport — 
sometimes called Lahrmann's hall — and the pivoters had bully 
times. Pete Stratton had the big sayso in them dancin' clubs, 
and Pete's vocal works was the noisyest in the burg, not 
exceptin' them of Auctioneer Van Tuyl. 

The poker hunters club usta enjoy their favorite pas- 
time on the top floor of the old Burtis, but never could agree 
on a name. One evenin' they was enjoyin' a 'possum dinner 
with injun trimmin's, and a soft-r visitor from down east 
happened to mention "pokeh huntehs," and then everybody 
got it. So the club was christened "Pocahontas" on the 
spot, and after that red chips were used for playin' jackpots. 
Ever heard of the Steve Gilman huntin' club, sport? In 
the old days them sportsmen was famous hunters and fishers 
in these parts, havin' such live members as Dick Englehart, 
Emmet Sharon, Ruel Cook, Endee Ely, Fod Davis, Steve Gil- 
man, Joe LeClaire, Ed Van Patten, Walter Chambers, Butch 
Thiele, Doc Elmer, Captain Jack McCaffrey, and other dead- 



217 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

game sports, that loved outdoor stuff. They hunted all over 
the western prairies, and in the fall and spring, when wild 
ducks and geese was flyin', they always had their muzzle 
loaders greased for action. 

Jim Means was guard on the draw- 
pier of the old wooden bridge then, 
and he acted as lookout for the Steve 
Gilman huntin' club when the teal, 
biuebills, mallards, and mazooks started 
flyin'. Jim had a special wild-duck sig- 
nal for the Steve Gilman boys — two 
long and two short toots of the whistle 
— warnin' members to hop into their 
huntin' togs, as the wild poultry was 
coastin' down the rapids and parkin' in 
the marshlands of the Wapsie and 
Devil's glen. 

The time the steamboat Effie Afton bumped into the old 
wooden bridge, Jim Means kinda lost his noodle, and instead 
of blowin' the distress signal, Jim tooted the Steve Gilman 
wild-duck call, and there was a mad rush of nimrods to the 
Piute club rooms. Pat Horan, steward at that time, was 
holdin' down the dog-watch, and he wondered why them 
sportsmen came rushin' in for their shootin'-irons. Pat made 
up cheese sandwiches and took a coupla cold bottles off the 
ice for them hunters before they discovered that Jim had 
pulled a boner. Then the Steve Gilman boys rushed down 
to the river, grabbed all the skiffs in sight, and hurried to 
rescue the passengers and crew of the Effie Afton. 





218 




Billiards and Drum Corps. 

Lannie McAffee trained billiard 
balls, and he could almost make 'em 
talk. Lannie would call a shot, "Carom, 
in the hat," and the cue ball would 
glance off the object ball and jump into 
his hat on a chair near the table to com- 
plete the carom. His trick dog, "Graff," 
would sit on a chair holdin' a billiard 
ball oh his nose, and Lannie would call 
his shot, "Carom, on the dog." Kinda 
ticklish for the dog, but he enjoyed it. 
Lannie could play fancy masse and 
draw shots, and was as clever at finger 

billiards as old Yank Adams. One evenin' Lannie hung up a 

world's record, punchin' out over fifteen hundred caroms at 

straight billiards at Billy Ball's saloon on east Third street. 
Henry Ascherman could whistle 

like a calleyope with his fingers, and 

little Packey Phelan bought a snare 

drum on the installment plan, at Job 

Ross's second-hand store, that drum 

havin' done service in the Mexican war. 

After Packey got so's he could knock 

off the single-drag and the double-drag, 

him and Henry organized the original 

Scott county drum corps, and them two 

kids marched at the head of the torch- 
light percessions in the Tilden and 

Hendrick parades. In them days some 

folks got the idea that the vote of New York state elected 

Grover, but us old timers knew it was the martial music of 

Packey and Henry that done the trick. 




219 




The Davenport Burns Club. 

In the early days a shipload of 
Scotchmen settled on the prairies north 
of Long Grove and scattered around 
town. After they pinched off some jack 
they began talkin' about Bobby Burns, 
and organized a social club in honor of 
their poet. Burns's festival grew to 
be the biggest affair of the old days, 
the dance startin' at eight in the evenin* 
and lastin' 'til ten the next mornin'. 
Hotscotch was served to men, hotwine 
to wimmen, haggle to everybody, and 
they danced old-fashioned dances, the 
highland fling, the sword dance, and other scotch steps. After 
twenty-five years the kiltie lads dropped out and the carps 
and harps hunched in. 

In the old days the Burns club had names like Neil 
Mclnnis, Dave Munro, John Cameron, George Shanks, Pete 
MacVey, John Craig, Tom Scholey, Bob Hunter, Adam Blair, 
Bob Munro, Billy Barraclough, Jim Lindsay, Jock McClos- 
key. Bob Swindell, and Mert Widdrington. After the crowd- 
in'-out process the Burns club had names like George 
Schwenke, Pete Jacobsen, Kelly Friday, Bill Dunker, Fred 
Rueffel, Dan Home, Martin Greeley, Ferd Meyer, Al Rodde- 
wig, Henry Klauer, Cal Witherspoon, Charlie Gallagher, 
Henry Jaeger and Ignatz Schmidt. The fiftieth anniversary 
festival at Turner hall filled both halls to capacity, and after 
that event the club held family parties at Lahrmann's hall for 
members only. 

Hay Donald Macmeyer was presectreas for twenty-five 
years, up to the time to the blowoff, with Ignatz, Schmidt as 
understudy. When Hay presided at meetin's he had his own 
parliamentary rules. Hay would move that his understudy 
be instructed to buy a bowl, then second his own motion, and 
after voting favor of his own motion. Hay would declare his 



221 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 






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lUSIC BY LUPPY'S UNION BAND. CAMERON, inm.pl... 

JOHN TURNER, Secretary, 



222 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

own motion carried unanimusly. Then Ignatz would obey 
the instructions of the presectreas. 

Even if them latter-day bobby-boys couldn't gargle their 
"r's" like Harry Lauder and sing "aboot a braw bricht moon- 
licht nicht, a' richt," when Hay Donald got his pipes primed 
with prime scotch and led the song service they could larrup 
the chorus of "Doktar Eisenbart" in Scott county scotch when 
singin' : 

Ich bin der Doktar Eisenbart, 

Villey, Villey vie turn boom! 
Kuhir die Leut* nach meiner Art, 

Villey, Villey vie turn boom! 
Kann maehen dass die Lahmen geh'n, 
Und dass die Blinden wieder seh'n, 

Villey, Villey vie tum boom! 

Victo-ri-ay! Victo-ri-ay! 

Villey, Villey vie du heirassa! 

Vieto-ri-ay! Victo-ri-ay! 

Villey, Villey vie tum boom! 

Didn't make any difference how hard the Burns club 
committee worked, when puttin' on their membership drives, 
they couldn't land any members from Corkhill, GoosehoUow, 
Flatiron square, Rogertown, or the Patch. 




223 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 









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224 



When Folks Were Sociable. 



After organizin' a baseball club, the Scott county Kidney- 
foot club held monthly suppers at Hill's cafe, and posted a 
challenge to the world in the kidneyfoot class, but couldn't 
find no takers. The lineup of that famous baseball team was 
— John Hill, shortstop; Tony Moore, first base; Billy MeGuin- 
ness, second base; Carl Thode, third base; Hugo Vollstedt, 
right field; Circus Koester, pitch; and Roxy Gundaker, catch. 

The Klam-Boreta club had a fine cabin in the woods at 
Toronto, and kept open house durin' the summer season. The 
charter members of that club were August Youngerman, 
Henry Klauer, Ferd Meyer, Soapy Matthes, Doodle Eck- 
hardt, Al Moetzel, Henry Thuenen, 
Spikes Strobehn, Herman Volquardsen, 
George Noth, Lew Roddewig, Ernst 
Zoiler, George Martin, Johnny Barof- 
sky, and Pete Jacobsen. 

The Fresh-Air club didn't believe 
in confinement between walls, so they 
took their fun out in the great open 
spaces, both winter and summer, hikin' 
all over the surroundin' country. The 
roster took in such fine old rounders as 
Oscar Staby, Lew Kuehl, Butch Lago- 
marcino, Lew Fahrner, Con Goettig, 
Forrest Downing, Walter Lucht, Otto Schrumm, Art Kelly, 
Albert Jansen, Fritz Becker, Fred Hoelmer, John Stelk, Vic 
Plath, Fred Kunkel, Herman Oetzmann, V/alter Hass, Phil 
Sonntag, Fink Lesser, Chris Heuck, Al Bruha, Dick Stelling, 
Charlie Calnan, Charlie Flannigan, Maj Meyer, Ed Freese, 
Gene Kelly, Hugo Schroeder, Jo'nn, Harry, and Otto Korn. 
Dad Offermann was the gay freshwater sailor of the good 
steamer "Grandpa" that carried the Fresh-Air boys on all 
their cruises along Rock river, the Hennepin canal, and up 
and down the old Mississippi. 




225 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Barnyard golf, shinny, and duck-on-davy were the leadin' 
games of the old days, and them sports has come back again 
strong. Of course the good old game of skat has been looked 
after by Gus Stueben, Fred Kunkel, Oswald Schmidt, Claus 
Kuehl, Otto Schrumm, Pete Bendixen, Herman Oetzmann, 
Chris Behrens, Dick Mittlebuscher, Ernst Otto, Walter 
Schmidt, Henry Von Maur, Leopold Siemon, Ed Berger, 
Frank Mueller, Ed Lischer, and other skatbugs that would 
rather play skat than eat fried spring chicken. 

The Night Owl club made regular monthly trips to 
Frobstei and Little's Grove to hold pinochle parties, under 
the direction of King Henry Schroeder. Pompey Petersen, 
Pathy Nagel, Cooney Kohrs, Feppo Roddewig, Ross Nagle, 
and Paul Severin were the charter members of that club. 

The Lauterbach club had a fine summer camp down at 
Billy Petersen's island, and ?Iugo Vollstedt, Billy Maehr, and 
Frank Colson looked after the comfort of visitin' tourists 

The Ideal club camped at McManus's island, and visitors 
were given the glad hand, day or night, by Oscar Schuup, 
Charlie Klein, Otto Gruenwald, and Billy Koch. 

Then there was famous old Slab hall up on Tenth street, 
between Farnam and LeClaire, a great club of the old days. 
Jim Coulter was band instructor at Slab hall, and he started 
the Light Guard band in the tootin' game. Lev/ and George 
Mallette, Jim Leonard, Tom Flynn, Pigiron Jones, Frank 
Foster, Billy Frazer, Jim Gorman, Owen Murray, Buck Lay- 
den, Gil Arnould, Pat Stapleton, Jack Higgins, Jim Roche, 
Pat Hanley, Billy Gordon, and a lota other young birds got 
their musical education in the conservatory department of 
Slab hall. 




226 



Curbstone Merrymakers. 




Mebbe you young fellers now'days 
think you're havin' lotsa fun, sport, but 
it ain't in it compared with the old 
days, when the boys played "All-in," 
"Tick-tack," "Bar-bar-ee," "I-spy," and 
other games. The old gangs never 
thought of goin' to dancin'-school to 
learn dancin', as they took lessons on 
street corners and stepped to the music 
of the mouthorgan or jewsharp. 

The Brady street gang held danc- 
in'-school sessions at the corner of 
Fourth, alongside the salt barrels at Hurto's grocery store. 
Granger V/allace and his mouthorgan bein' the orchestra. 
When them youngsters got so's they could waltz, schottische, 
and polka, and go through quadrilles without a skip, they 
tried out their work at the Mayday dance and children's ball 
at Turner hall, on the Monday after bird-shootin' day at 
Schuetzen. 

The Goosehollow gang usta take dancin' lessons at the 
corner of Eighth and Harrison, near Noth's brewery, and some 
mighty fine dancers graduated from Goosehollow dancin' 
school. There was Dandy Devine, Pete Shaughnessy, Jim 
Devlin, Benny Stuehmer, Billy Carroll, Jim Sweeney, Hugo 
Moeller, Job O'Brien, Lew Pickens, Buck Timothy, Shanley 
McPartland, Cooney Raphael, Jimmy Gannon, Poker Devine, 
Heiney Paulsen, Jimmy Stretch, Billy Shine, Dutch Stuehmer, 
Teeson Carroll, Tom Boyd, Chooky Kuphal, Din Harrigan, 
Henry Frahm, Owen Sweeney, Hoosier Osborn, Hoy Stueh- 
mer, Stiffy Brophy, Jim Houghton, Frank Pillion, Duckfoot 
McFarland, and a lota other young bloods that learned to 
waltz on their toes, without touchin' their heels, while Bogus 
McGee played "After the Ball" on the mouthorgan. 

The Slough gang, down in the west end, had the best 
outdoor dancin' school in the burg, though. Them lads had 



227 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 




Scott County Kidneyfcot Club. 
Charlie Seeniann, Huso Vollsteilt, Hill Ko.^ster. 



228 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 



regular nights for dancin' classes, down at John Schnaack's 
corner, on Third and Howell, and the niftiest four-piece or- 
chestra of any gang — not barrin' the Rogertowns, with Chris 
Kuehl and his accordeon. Dutch Klauer was leader of that 
famous orchestra, and he v/as the slickest jewsharp plunker 
in town. Jack Powers done quiyery, shaky stuff on the 
mouthorgan, and Charlie Coen done jazz work, bazzooin' 
through a piece of paper on a comb. Mike Malloy 'tended to 
the bass movement by rubbin' a broom-handle across his finger 
on a cracker box. Them musicianers held regular rehearsals, 
and got goin' so flossy that they could get more action outa 
"The Irish Washerwoman," "Finne- 
gan's Wake," and other lively tunes 
than Jakey Strasser, Ernst Otto, Bob 
Swindell, or any of them music guys 
that played by note. 

One evenin', about nine o'clock, 
when Fat Walsh v/as easin' home from 
work kinda early, the Slough boys vv^as 
callin' "One more couple Vv'anted!" — as 
they v/as tryin' to fill two sets for a 
cjuadrille. So when Fat stopped to chin 
with Big Jim. McMahon about a job of 
gradin' they was doin', Byber Garvey 
at;t Fat would he do the callin' for that dance, so's little Mike 
Lamb could take his place v/ith the head couple and fill out 
the set. Pat said sure thing, that callin' was his middle name, 
and when he took his stand over near the orchestra he ast 
them dancers was they all full, and they hollered not yet 
but soon — it bein' close to election time. 

You kin tell 'em, sport, there v/as some fine steppin' that 
evenin', with Pat Walsh callin' that quadrille and the orches- 
tra puttin' in its nastiest licks playin' "The Devil's Dream," 
"My Love Nell," and "The Leg of a Duck." Understand, 
them boys was well organized and had a system workin' in 
their dancin' classes, so's they could tell guys from gals when 
dancin', the gals always havin' a handkerchief tied on their 
arms — provided they was enough handkerchiefs in the gang 
to go around. 




229 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

The gals dancin' in the quadrille that evenin' were Miniiis 
McGrath, Scoop Cottrell, Toad Keating, Nibs Collins, Bum 
McMahon, Chip Bryson, Doshen McGrath, Joe Steadley, 
Vonko Lynch, and Sheeney Powers, and all them birds had 
handkerchiefs tied to their arms exceptin' Chip Bryson, who 
was wearin' his red flannin undershirt, havin' been workin' 
overtime at the foundry that evenin'. The guys that danced 
were Heiney Sievers, Byber Garvey, Billy Lavery, Buer Mc- 
Grath, Jimmy O'Brien, Tug Lynch, Jim Cooney, Zulo Haugh, 
and Dick Malone, and they sure done some fancy steppin'. 
Big Tom and Little Tom Garvey acted as floor managers, to 
see that everything moved right, and when they hollered "All 
set," Fat 'Walsh gave the high-sign to Dutch Klauer, and then 
called out, "First four right and left!" Pat sent them Slough 
beys through their paces at top speed on ail three changes 
of the quadrille, and then he done the callin' for the Virginia 
reel before goin' home. 

Them Slough jakes certainly did hit it up that evenin', 
sport, and when the orchestra played "Home, Sv.-eet Home," 
for the last dance, they hadta play six encores before them 
young buckos would let 'em put away their instruments. 

And that's how it came about that the boys of the Slough 
g£ng ccpped all the prizes for vv-altzin' at the social club dances 
that was held in the Stockyards and Heineyhall in the old 
days before the shimrny-shakers broke loose. 




230 




The Happy Ending. 

EIN' as most folks is keen for happy endin' hoke, 
sport, they won't stand for a leadpipe blowoff. 
So, not havin' a chance to pull weddin'-bell soft- 
stuff — outside of framin' the cruel and inhuman 
against General Houston, or sumpin — just imagine. . . . 

A balmy October evenin', fifty years ago — the old Brady 
street gsng sittin' en the boardwalk in front of Liliis's grocery, 
dangiin' their feet in the slabstone gutter. The harvest moon 
rises slowly over the maples near Worley's livery barn, shim- 
merin' its silvery rays in the crisp autumn air. 

Old Murt Burns gives the highsign with his red lantern 
to Connie O'Brien on ingine seventy-tv/o, and throws the 
switch to give the right-of-way to the Kilkenny crew. That 
janglin' bell you hear comin' up the street, sport, is on the 
hoss that Henry Schnitger is drivin' on his bobtail street car. 

John Haley and Fhil Nagle are arguin' politics with Job 
Ross and Andy Butler in front of Dave Hunter's meat market. 
Old Aunt Lucy and Granny Conyer toddle slowly along the 
street, laughin' and enjoyin' theirselves, after a hard day's 
work at washin' and ironin'. 

But listen, sport! Hear that tinklin' guitar and the 
singin', comin' up the street? That's the old quartet — Jim 
Dermody, Tom Biddison, Joe Carroll, and Tommy Mack — 
returnin' in the open landau with Doc Worley, after sere- 
nadin' down at Johnny McGuinness's. 

And see that mob of kids foilyin' 'em! 

And look — there's Max Ochs and Lawrie the Coon, 
comin' across the street from "Stingy" Black's ice cream par- 
lor. If old Til dcn't bust in, to show his authority, they'll be 
sumpin doin' purty soon. 

Who's that hollerin', eh? Oh, that's young Stony John- 
ston, callin' to Doc Vv^orley, astin' him v/on't he sing the "Old 
Song," and Doc hollers back and says sure thing. 

Now, sport, we'll hear real melody when Doc gets 
through plunkin' the prelude and rollin' the bass runs. 



231 



THEM WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS 

Listen! That's Jim Dermody's voice. He's singin' the 
first verse of the "Old Song," . . . and now comes the 
chorus : 

Just a song at twilight, 

V/hen the lights are low 

Now — Tom Biddison and Tommy Mack join in with — 

And the flickerin' shadows 
Softly come and go 

That sweet-voiced tenor on the high notes, sport, is 
little Joe Carroll, . . . and now they're all singin' — 

Though the heart be weary. 

Sad the day and long, 
Still to me at twilight, 

Comes love's old song 

Now — listen to Doc Worley, Max Ochs, and Lawrie 
the coon, with his deep-cellar bass, joinin' in, as they slow 
dcwn and put feelin' into the last line — 

Comes love's — old sweet song. 

Hear the applause of that big crov/d, sport! Kinya 
beat it! Say, boy — mebbe old Saint Peter has better singers 
in that choir of his'n, waitin' to greet tired old timers when 
the last call comes, but you can't make them birds believe 
there's any niftier harmonizers inside the pearly gates until 
Gabriel blows his trumpet and says, "Come on, boys!" 

That's real old time melody, sport, and nobody kin 
blame a guy, after hearin' the old quartet, for throwin' out 
his chest and tellin' all the world that 

Them was the good old days. 




232 



